Education Update :: November/December 2018

Award Award Winner Winner

Volume XXIV, No. 2 • New York City • NOV/DEC 2018

www.EducationUpdate.com

CUTTING EDGE NEWS FOR ALL THE PEOPLE

THOMAS BAILEY

PRESIDENT, TEACHERS COLLEGE

U.S. POSTAGE PAID THE EDUCATION UPDATE PRESORTED STANDARD

2

EDUCATION UPDATE

Pathways to Progress: Strategic Planning and Outcomes

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

GUEST EDITORIALS

The College of Staten Island Is Entering a New Era of Excellence, Creating the Opportunity to Ascend

Touro College: A Place Where Knowledge and Values Meet

By DR. ALAN KADISH

By DR. CONRADO “BOBBY” GEMPESAW, PRESIDENT, ST. JOHN’S UNIVERSITY When I joined St. John’s University more than four years ago, I expressed confidence that St. John’s can overcome the daunting challenges of higher education and continue to thrive as one of the nation’s premier Catholic universities. Guided by a shared vision of a better and stronger St. John’s, the University embarked on a consensus-driven approach of identifying and planning the implementation of four strategic priorities: • Ensure student success.

• Recruit, recognize, and retain the best faculty, staff, and administrators.

• Enhance our teaching and learning environment.

• Expand global and community partnerships.

Four years after establishing these priorities, St. John’s is now better prepared and positioned to react to market forces and to move forward without wavering from our founding Vincentian mission to provide an affordable, quality, Catholic education to all — especially to those most in need.

This action-oriented approach to planning is led by a representative group called the Strategic Priorities Review Team, which is composed of a cross-section of our diverse University community, including the active participation of students. The team monitors the University-wide implementation of the Strategic Priorities Action Plan and provides timely updates at annual academic and administrative retreats where data-driven analyses continued on page 14

By DR. WILLIAM J. FRITZ

Over roughly the last five years, the College of Staten Island has experienced a transformation. It has not gone unnoticed — the College is now showing up on virtually all of the major rankings of America’s Best Colleges, from Forbes’ to U.S. News & World Report’s to the Wall Street Journal’s.

I’m excited to think of what lies ahead because we are clearly entering an era of excelcontinued on page 14

IN THIS ISSUE Guest Editorials. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2, 4 Colleges & Grad Schools. . 4, 9, 14, 22, 24, 26 Spotight on Schools. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6, 10 Rebecca Seawright. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9, 17 Book Reviews. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Law. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11, 13 K–12 Trends. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Ethics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 STEM. . . . . . . . . . . 16, 18, 20, 21, 23, 26 Health. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Sports. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 History & Social Studies . . . . 19, 27, 29 Movie Review. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 Obituary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Touro College was founded in 1970 to educate, to serve, to perpetuate and to enrich the historic Jewish tradition of tolerance and dignity through education. With almost fifty years of experience, I would like to report on what we have accomplished and how we rely upon our mission to drive successful outcomes.

Touro’s founding vision sets us apart in four distinct ways: First, its dual mission, and to help build a better society for all to strengthen Jewish life; Second, the community-oriented values we imbue in our graduates; Third, our commitment to career guidance, which points our students toward meaningful professions.

Fourth, the willingness to adapt to changing needs that has always been part of the Jewish Tradition.

Touro’s core values are drawn from our Jewish heritage which focuses simultaneously on individual development and the greater good. Touro’s 19,200 students, enrolled at over 30 colleges and schools in four states and four countries, are educated to believe that return on investment refers both to economic prosperity and social justice.

Scholarship and the Jewish Intellectual Tradition The Jewish Intellectual Tradition has been characterized for several millenia by the pursuit of truth through logical inquiry and an emphasis on education. This tradition has produced a high rate of engagement with higher education, longstanding almost universal literacy and in the past few centuries, outstanding achievements in fields as diverse as music, philosophy, continued on page 14

■

NOV/DEC 2018

Education Update MAILING ADDRESS: 695 Park Avenue, Ste. E1509, NY, NY 10065 Email: ednews1@aol.com www.EducationUpdate.com Tel: 212-650-3552 Fax: 212-410-0591 PUBLISHERS: Pola Rosen, Ed.D., Adam Sugerman, M.A. ADVISORY COUNCIL: April Bedford, Ph.D., Dean of Education, Brooklyn College; Dominic Brewer, Ph.D., Dean of Education, New York University Steinhardt; Mark Cannizzaro, Pres., CSA; Christine Cea, Ph.D., NYS Board of Regents; Mary Driscoll, Ph.D., Dean, CCNY; Shelia Evans-Tranumn, Chair, Board of Trustees, Casey Family Programs Foundation; Scott Evenbeck, Ph.D., President, Guttman Community College, CUNY; Charlotte K. Frank, Ph.D., Sr. Advisor, McGrawHill; Joan Freilich, Ph.D., Trustee, College of New Rochelle; Andrew Gardner, Director, BrainPOP Educators; Kenneth Gold, Ph.D., Dean of Education, College of Staten Island; Cynthia Greenleaf, Ed.M., J.D., Former Dir. of Partnerships, Chicago Public Schools; Donne Kampel, Ph.D., Dean, Touro College; Augusta S. Kappner, Ph.D., President Emerita, Bank St. College; Harold Koplewicz, M.D., Pres., Child Mind Institute; Shenzhan Liao, Director of Education, China Institute; Cecelia McCarton, M.D., Dir., The McCarton Center; Craig Michaels, Ph.D., Dean of Education, Queens College; Michael Mulgrew, Pres., UFT; Eric Nadelstern, Prof. of Educational Leadership, Teachers College; Alfred S. Posamentier, Ph.D., LIU; Rose Rudnitski, Dean, School of Education, Mercy College; John Russell, Ed.D., Head, Windward School; Michael Sampson, Ph.D., Dean of Education, St. John’s University; Debra Shanley, Ph.D., Dean School of Education, Lehman College; Ronald P. Stewart, Head, York Prep; Adam Sugerman, Publisher, Palmiche Press MANAGING EDITOR: Adam Sugerman ASSOCIATE EDITORS: Heather Rosen Faulkner, Rob Wertheimer SENIOR ASSISTANT EDITOR: Lydia Liebman STAFF WRITERS: Jan Aaron, Joan Baum, Ph.D., Miranda Goodwin-Raab, Gillian Granoff, Merryl Kafka, Ed.D., Sybil Maimin, Samantha Nazareth, M.D. GUEST COLUMNIST: Katie Diament; Mariko Fukuoka, Ph.D.; Brenda Green, Ph.D.; Margaux Montagner; Jason Ohler, Ph.D.; Leonard Quart, Ph.D.; Assembly Member Rebecca A. Seawright; Dana Stahl; John Tanacredi, Ph.D. BOOK REVIEWS: Joan Baum, Ph.D., Merri Rosenberg LAW EDITOR: Arthur Katz, J.D. LAW REPORTER & ETHICIST: Jacob Appel, M.D., J.D. MATHEMATICS EDITOR: Alfred Posamentier, Ph.D. MEDICAL EDITOR: Herman Rosen, M.D., F.A.C.P. MOVIE & THEATER REVIEWS: Jan Aaron SPORTS EDITOR: Mike Cohen ART DIRECTOR: Neil Schuldiner VIDEOGRAPHER: Carlos del Rosario Education Update is an independent newspaper, which is published bimonthly by Education Update, Inc.. All material is copyrighted and may not be printed without express consent of the publisher.

POSTMASTER: Send address changes to: Education Update; 695 Park Avenue, Ste. E1509, New York, NY 10065-5024.

Subscription: Annual $30.

Copyright © 2018 Education Update

Connect with Education Update on these social media outlets:

NOV/DEC 2018

EducationUpdate_11.5.INSERTION.indd 1

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

3

10/17/18 12:10 PM

4

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

Since being named Teachers College’s president this past spring, I’ve been repeatedly asked two questions.

“Why did you want this job?” and “What are you planning to do?” The answers to the first question are easy: Because of TC’s extraordinary history of inventing new fields and guiding the nation and the world through key periods of change. Because our College has always been a powerful, finely-tuned instrument for creating better lives and life chances for all people.

Because we have the breadth of expertise to tackle the world’s most complex problems. And above all, because of the remarkable graduates that we produce.

There are countless examples of people who came to the College with a passion to change the world, learned essential skills and made essential contacts here, and have since gone on to fulfill their aspirations. They run the gamut from young to old, and they represent a vast diversity of backgrounds and cultures.

To share the stories of just two who have been much on our minds lately: Samuel Totten (Ed.D. ’85), Professor Emeritus at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, is one of the world’s leading genocide scholars. He would deserve mention here simply for his groundbreaking scholarship documenting atrocities in some of the world’s most afflicted regions. But in “retirement,” Dr. Totten, who is 69 years old, has gone a step further: He makes periodic trips to Sudan to personally deliver truckloads of food to villagers in the Nuba Mountains, where the nation’s government has been conducting a scorchedearth campaign.

Or take Sayu Bohjwani (Ph.D. ’14). She is the founding director of New American Leaders, a nonprofit that recruits and trains first- and second-generation Americans to run for political office. On Election Day this year, 50 candidates recruited by NAL are appearing on ballots nationwide. Dr. Bhojwani, who previously served as New York City’s first commissioner of Immigrant Affairs, is also author of the recently published book People Like Us: The New Wave of Candidates Knocking at Democracy’s Door (The New Press).

Again, that kind of commitment to creating a more just and equitable world is part of TC’s DNA. Like all great universities and colleges, we are home to brilliant people doing fascinating work. But what truly sets us apart is that – from shaping more effective teaching to getting entire communities to embrace healthier lifestyles – we directly apply our knowledge in

WhiteHouse.gov

By PRESIDENT THOMAS BAILEY, TEACHERS COLLEGE

NOV/DEC 2018

Supreme Court Associate Justice Elena Kagan Honored at Hunter College

GUEST EDITORIAL

Taking Teachers College’s Impact to Scale

■

President Barack Obama talks with Justice Elena Kagan and Chief Justice John Roberts before Kagan’s Investiture Ceremony at the Supreme Court in 2010

the here and now.

And that leads to the answer to the second question I’m frequently asked – “So, what are you planning to do?” On one level, the answer is simple: everything I possibly can to increase that impact. In reality, of course, that’s a complex challenge. One thing I have learned from my previous work, which has focused on improving America’s community colleges, is that advancing ideas for reform is not enough.

We need to change institutions so that there is a pathway for each student and each person, at every phase of life. At TC, then, we must ensure that we attract and support the best students, increase our research funding, and assure the coherence of our programs and course offerings. We must take a comprehensive and holistic view of our own students’ pathways.

And ultimately, we must work with each other and with practitioners to create solutions broad enough to address major societal issues yet sufficiently nuanced to work in different cultures and contexts.

I’m proud to say that we are currently applying just such a comprehensive approach to helping American colleges and universities better serve students from poor, minority and immigrant backgrounds. With the United States on pace to become a majority non-white nation by 2045, these students literally represent the future of our country. “They” are us, and – as visionaries at TC have always understood – if we fail them, we fail ourselves. #

By LYDIA LIEBMAN Recently, Hunter College honored Supreme Court Associate Justice Elena Kagan with an Honorary Degree. Justice Kagan attended Hunter College Elementary School (’71) and Hunter College High School (’77) and is part of a strong Hunter College legacy; her mother Gloria (a Hunter College graduate) taught at Hunter College Elementary School for 20 years and her brother eventually went on to teach at Hunter College High School. In her opening remarks, Hunter College President Jennifer Raab praised Justice Kagan for her trailblazing career. “You have brought honor to the educational institutions that helped prepare you beginning with the Hunter College campus schools. You have truly fulfilled the Hunter motto: The Care of the Future is Mine. And you are also the perfect role model for one of my favorite sayings: “You can always tell a Hunter girl, but you can’t tell her much!”

Justice Kagan gave a thoughtful speech upon receiving her Honorary Doctorate. “In my family, this is better than receiving the Nobel Prize!” She reflected upon her experiences at Hunter College High School fondly and praised Hunter College as a place where the American dream can indeed come true. Immediately following the ceremony, Justice Kagan sat down with the Dean of Harvard Law School, John F. Manning.

Dean Manning asked Justice Kagan a great range of questions. Among them, Dean Manning asked Justice Kagan about her mother, Gloria, who achieved almost legendary status as an educator. “My mother had very high standards.

She really believed that you were wasting your time if you were not living up to your potential.

That message came through loud and clear”.

She said she applies her mothers’ advice in her own life and in her teaching at Harvard Law School. Dean Manning also asked her ques-

tions that could be helpful to the students in the audience about how to chart a career path.

She spoke about her journey through college at Princeton University as a history major and eventually went to law schools “for all the wrong reasons”. She found that she loved law school and especially enjoyed studying law. “I thought you could really make a different with it,” she said, “law matters.” She said that serendipity played a large part in her career; she said that when she was Dean at Harvard Law School she considered quitting law until she received the call for Solicitor General, which eventually led to her appointment to the Supreme Court.

She offered good advice: “You shouldn’t plan too much…you should be open to new possibilities, new things and keep an eye out for when they come along.”

Dean Manning also asked Justice Kagan to explain how the Supreme Court works. Justice Kagan went over the nuts-and-bolts of the court; how cases are selected, how cases progress, and how the justices eventually reach a decision. One particularly interesting question was if opinions ever do actually change during a case. Justice Kagan said that oral arguments can have an impact. “All of us move back and forth over the course of reading the briefs and hearing arguments on a fair number of cases,” she said. After Dean Manning interviewed Justice Kagan, she took questions from students including two fifth graders, a high school senior, and two college students.

Justice Kagan ended her time by thanking Hunter College, Hunter College High School and Hunter College Elementary School. “[They] so made me the person I am more than any other educational institution. By the time I got out of Hunter High School, I was pretty much what you see. I will be endlessly grateful to all the administrators and faculty members and fellow students for doing that.” #

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

5

6

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

Ann Tisch’s Student Leadership Network Honors Three Outstanding Leaders

■

NOV/DEC 2018

Grammy Nominated Vocalist Jean Baylor Joins Manhattan School of Music Faculty

2018 Honorees, Valerie Radwaner and Bruce Mosler

By LYDIA LIEBMAN Student Leadership Network, formerly known at the Young Women’s Leadership Network, celebrated its annual (Em)Power Breakfast at Cipriani this fall. This year celebrated 22 years since founders Ann and Andrew Tisch opened their first school, the Young Women’s Leadership School (TYWLS) in East Harlem. Upon opening the first all-girls public school in the United States in 30 years, the Tisch’s started a revolution for girls and education in New York City and beyond.

Over two decades later, the newly renamed organization is as vibrant and important as ever: there are 2,500 students at five TYWLS New York City district public schools and another 6,500 students at affiliates around the country. Nearly 100% of graduates are accepted to college and able to benefit from the nearly $123 million in financial aid that TYWLS students have received since 2001.

This year, three outstanding models of leadership were honored: actress Tracee Ellis Ross, attorney Valerie Radwaner, and businessman Bruce Mosler. Ms. Ross was the first to be honored, continuing an (Em)Power Breakfast tradition of honoring stars from the ABC comedy series “Black-ish” (Both “Black-ish” creator Kenya Barris and young star Yara Shahidi had been previously honored by the organization).

Ross is a graduate of Brown University and one of Hollywood’s most prominent actresses.

She has received numerous awards including a Golden Globe and an NAACP Image Award for three years in a row. She uses her platform to bring awareness to many important issues including inclusivity and equity and has been at the forefront of the Me Too movement in recent months.

Following in a relatively new format for the breakfast, Ross took part in Q&A with a student, in this particular instance over Skype. Ross was asked a number of great questions including

one that asked what has inspired her activism.

“What’s happening in our world is encouraging me to stretch out of my comfort zone and to use my voice as a platform in ways that I think in the past might have frightened me. That fear is outweighed by my desire to be of service and help encourage change,” she said. She also gave credit to her mother (the legendary Diana Ross) for always being a great inspiration to her.

The second award was given to Bruce Mosler, Chairman of Global Brokerage at Cushman and Wakefield. In his prominent position, he advises major tenants and investors on strategic real estate matters, managing key client relationships on behalf of the firm globally. Recognized as the “Man We Love”, Mosler expressed how important it is for women to be supported in education and in the workplace. “There are more women entering the STEM arena than there ever has been and I think it’s a vital part of pushing this nation forward,” he said.

The final recognition went to Valerie Radwaner.

Radwaner is the Deputy Chair of Paul, Weiss and a member of the firm’s Management Committee.

In her position, she works to develop, oversee, and implement the firm’s strategic priorities.

She is a member of the Global Advisory Board of Women in Law Empowerment Forum and also sits on the Thomson Reuters Women’s Transformative Leadership Advisory Board.

Radwaner offered some excellent advice to the young women in attendance. “Use your voice!

Make sure that your voice is heard,” she said.

“Treat all people with respect. She also echoed the sentiment made famous by Michelle Obama: when they go low, we go high. And like Tracee Ellis Ross, Radwaner also counted her mother as a huge influence in her life.

In conclusion, this year’s (Em)Power Breakfast was as inspiring as ever. #

Jean Baylor

Multiple Grammy nominee Jean Baylor is proud to announce that she has joined the faculty at Manhattan School of Music. Starting this semester, Jean will be teaching Jazz Voice and Ensembles in the Jazz Arts program, under the direction of Jazz Arts Director Stefon Harris.

With 25 years of experience as an accomplished recording artist, songwriter, producer and performer, Jean Baylor has generations of musical influence that she has carefully crafted into her own distinct vocal stylings. After graduating from Temple University having studied Jazz Vocal Performance, she made her mark as one-half of the platinum recording duo, Zhane, influencing a generation of music listeners into a new genre, Neo-Soul.

Further developing as a songwriter, Jean composed songs for popular artists and major motion picture soundtracks. Shifting her focus to business ownership, Jean teamed up with her husband, Marcus Baylor, to create an independent record label, Be A Light and formed a new musical union, The Baylor Project, an enticingly innovative approach to jazz which encompasses their combined influences of gospel, blues and soul, all while bridging the gap between generations. Their debut release, “The Journey” received two GRAMMY® nominations for Best Jazz Vocal Album and Best

Traditional R&B Performance for Original Composition, solidifying The Baylor Project as an undeniable force.

Jean has been a featured guest artist in performances and recordings with Yellowjackets, Kenny Garrett, Buster Williams, Marcus Miller, Stefon Harris, Jimmy Greene, Eric Benet, Jose James, Will Downing, Naughty By Nature, Busta Rhymes, De La Soul, and others.

Well-equipped with an agile mezzo-soprano range, Jean’s voice has been described as sweet, sultry and poignant; she combines a fresh, whimsical approach to phrasing with clever improvisation resulting in singing of such vocal purity that embraces the soul.

Having come full circle, Jean is passionate about utilizing her skills to impact the next generation of music professionals.

“I am extremely excited to join the MSM Faculty for jazz voice. I enjoy sharing my approach to jazz music and beyond and look forward to being an integral part of the students’ learning and growth experience,” says Jean of her new appointment.

Jean joins an illustrious faculty at MSM that includes Ron Carter, Buster Williams, David Liebman, Bobby Sanabria, Regina Carter, and Vincent Herring, among others.

More information about Manhattan School of Music can be found online at msmnyc.edu. #

NOV/DEC 2018

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

Their Dreams Have No Limits.

■

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

7

Their Dreams Have No Limits.

!"#$%"&'()$*"+,-$%."&&(/

Dwight Global — the online program of Dwight School —

Why Should Their School?

while receiving a world-class education. Students can train, travel, compete, and perform without missing school.

Dwight Global — the online program of Dwight School — offers students pursuing their passions a flexible schedule while receiving a world-class private school education. Students can train, travel, compete, and perform without missing school.

Dwight Global Offers FLEXIBILITY • • •

Join online classes from anywhere Personalize your schedule Take summer courses

01,2"3$4(&56($788+-9

ACADEMIC EXCELLENCE • • •

Online IB and AP classes for grades 7-12 FLEXIBILITY College guidance starting in grade 9 Join online classes from anywhere Top college acceptances

COMMUNITY • •

Study at Dwight global campuses Attend summer courses

Participate in blended learning programs Study at Dwight campuses in 5 countries ACADEMIC RIGOR

Online IB and AP classes for grades 7-12 College guidance starting in grade 9 admissions@dwight.edu Excellent college acceptances 212.724.2420

www.dwight.global

New York | London | Seoul | Shanghai | Dubai

2420 | www.dwight.global | New York | London | Seoul | Shanghai | Dubai dwight_tennisad_FNL_10wx1047D.indd 1

10/31/18 10:18 PM

8

SPECIAL EDUCATION

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

NOV/DEC 2018

The Child Mind Institute has provided life-changing treatment for mental health and learning disorders to more than 8,000 children from across the country and around the world since 2009.

• More than half of children reached received free or reduced-cost services.

• School programs have served over 18,000 students, parents, and educators.

• Millions of families and educators find free information and expert advice about children’s mental health at childmind.org.

Please join us to celebrate these achievements at the 9th annual

Child Mind Institute Child Advocacy Award Dinner November 19, 2018 | Cipriani 42nd Street Hosted by Ali Wentworth and George Stephanopoulos Honoring Ashok Varadhan, Partner and Global Co-Head of Securities, Goldman Sachs; 2018 Child Advocacy Award Recipient John Weisz, PhD, Professor of Psychology, Harvard University; Sarah Gund Prize for Research and Mentorship in Child Mental Health

childmind.org

For more information and for tickets, visit childmind.org/2018benefit.

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

9

By BLAINE FRIEDLANDER

Cornell’s College of Engineering presented David A. Duffield ’62, MBA ’64, with the inaugural Cornell Engineering Distinguished Alumni Award — its highest alumni honor — which recognizes extraordinary leadership, vision, and bringing distinction to the college.

“The college has produced many extraordinary and talented engineers in its 150-year history. Graduates in my opinion have changed whole industries. … It’s been a wonderful privilege as a dean to meet these people,” said Lance Collins, the Joseph Silbert Dean of Engineering, who presented Duffield the award recently.

An engineer, businessman, entrepreneur and philanthropist, Duffield founded six companies, including two highly successful business enterprise software firms, PeopleSoft and Workday.

Collins said that Cornell Engineering blends rigorous fundamentals with a sense of practical mission. “Dave, you embody the best of these ideals. It is really remarkable,” said Collins.

“You have a nose for [exploring] gaps in software, where there are opportunities … to fill those gaps with really interesting companies, with really interesting cultures.”

David Duffield speaks with Lance Collins after receiving the Cornell Engineering Distinguished Alumni Award.

“Most important is your sense of personal mission. You’re trying to improve the lives of the millions of people who use your software and the thousands of people who work with you, and I admire both of those greatly — and I use those lessons in my own work,” said Collins. “Thank you for being an incredible example to us all.”

Duffield has a long history of giving back to the university. His naming gift for Duffield Hall enabled the construction of one of the top nanoscale facilities in the country and provides a location that is the heart and soul of the College of Engineering. He also funded the Workday Atrium in Gates Hall and Workday Labs and other named spaces in Gates, Phillips, Rhodes, and Sage halls. Duffield was named Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year in 1996.

Duffield and his wife, Cheryl, founded Maddie’s Fund, which supports companion animal welfare and promotes no-kill animal shelters across the country. Through this fund, the Duffields created and continue to support the Maddie’s Shelter Medicine Program at Cornell’s College of Veterinary Medicine, which has a strong partnership with the SPCA of Tompkins County.

Before receiving the Distinguished Alumni Award, Duffield shared insights with the dean and the Phillips Hall audience, discussing his college days (which included playing varsity baseball and playing bass in a rock band) and his own career — which started at IBM in Rochester, New York, following graduation.

Cornell Brand Communications

Specialty High School Duffield Receives Engineering̓s Highest Alumni Honor at Cornell Admissions/Proposed Changes and N eed for D iscussion

Lance Collins, the Joseph Silbert Dean of Engineering, right, awards David Duffield with the Cornell Engineering Distinguished Alumni Award – the college's highest alumni honor.

Duffield explained that his father, who did not attend college, instilled in him a love for aerospace engineering. But his career trajectory changed when Duffield took a computer programming class taught by Bill Maxwell, now the Andrew Schultz Jr. Professor Emeritus of Engineering. Duffield said he performed poorly in the class, but Maxwell gave him the chance to retake it. Maxwell and Duffield eventually became partners in one of Duffield’s early business ventures, and Maxwell proudly sat in the front row when Duffield accepted his award.

Duffield also offered words of wisdom for budding engineers. “When you graduate, join a great company. I joined IBM. … Today it would be Amazon, Microsoft, Apple … and of course Workday is a great company,” Duffield said, and smiled when mentioning his new venture Ridgeline, a software development company. “Ridgeline. Join our team. We’ve got another A Team.”

More advice followed. “Be in sales. Be aware that it is important that your company sell its products, whether you’re in administration or development — you have got to be in sales,” he said.

Duffield also emphasized the importance of innovation. “Go to this great company and look around for a problem to solve. Do it well, whether you’re helping sell a new customer or helping to fix a customer problem,” he said.

Finally, he said, hone communication skills, particularly writing and presenting. And “Work your tail off.” # Reprinted with permission from Cornell Chronicle.

By NYS ASSEMBLY MEMBER REBECCA A. SEAWRIGHT As a member of the Education Committee of the New York State Assembly, I voted “NO” on the bill introduced near the end of the last legislative session that sought to substantially change the admissions criteria of Specialty High Schools (SHS) and to eliminate the specialized high school admission test (SHSAT).

The bill was announced on a Friday in June with a vote then immediately scheduled on the following Wednesday at the Education Committee. I stand by my vote and public statement at that time. Expressing my strong reservations, I insisted we need input from all stakeholders, public hearings, the opportunity for views to be aired, questioned asked and answered and for all communities to be heard. Shortly thereafter the Committee meeting, at which the bill narrowly passed in a contentious environment, the Assembly leadership wisely withdrew the bill from consideration. But the subject is far from over.

So last week, I co-sponsored with the Education Committee of Community Board 8, a Forum on the issues. The event confirmed my belief in how essential public discourse is on these educational policies.

The room was over-flowing with interested parents and guardians. There were over-flowing passions as well; expressions of concern by family members about the future of their children. Critical for me, as an elected representative, was the opportunity to listen to the questions being asked. Quite frankly, it was important to bear witness to the genuine anxiousness in the room regarding proposed changes that would upset the educational plans that many of my constituents have for their children.

As part of the evening program, they heard directly from representatives of the NYC Department of Education (DOE) about the proposed plan, which would phase out the SHSAT over a three-year period — something most in the room had not actually seen before our Forum. The DOE presented the multiple factors the proposal set forth for future admissions. The proposal includes expanding the Discovery Program to 20% of the seats at each Specialty High School (until the SHSAT is phased out over three years). The Discovery Program is a summer program that provides enrichment that helps high-performing, economically disadvantaged students gain admissions to the Specialty High Schools. Over a three-year period, the DOE would phase out the SHSAT and offer admissions to the top 7% of students from each DOE public middle school, with consideration given to (1) their 7th grade New York State

Math and ELA exam scores and (2) their 7th grade English, math, social studies and science course grades compared to others in their school. Furthermore, any student would have to be in the top 25% of top ranking students to earn admissions.

During the phase out process, the SHSAT will gradually be eliminated as an admissions criteria. During the first year, 75% of admits will be based on the exam score (25% will be granted to the top 3% of each middle school), the second year will see a 50/50 split between SHSAT score admits and the top 5% from each middle school until eventually the new admissions process of the stated middle school academic record from middle school is in place. Special note (one which will affect many families) is that prospective students who are not already in the NYC public school system will have a much less likely chance of gaining a seat in one of our Specialty High Schools as those with at least a GPA of 93 (A-) will enter into a lottery for any remaining seats.

It was apparent that there are no simple solutions to balance maintaining academic standards with increasing diversity and fairness. So we organized and presented a panel that offered different perspectives on the situation — Larry Cary, a Brooklyn Technical High School alumnus who believes the test should remain as an academic standard; David Bloomfield, a Professor of Educational Leadership at Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center, who is opposed to the single test being a measure; and Amy Hsin, a Professor of Sociology at Queens College and a member of the NYC School Diversity Advisory Committee, who reflected on the qualities of “deservedness” and “work ethic” and the judgments made about each. It was a robust, highly informative discussion.

The discussion we began in our District will continue. Though the next legislative session is not scheduled until January, 2019, and the next NYS Executive Budget will be the predominate focus through the Spring, we must prudently use the time now to tap community input. We must continue to listen and learn and enlighten each other before we consider any changes that will affect many future generations of NYC residents. We must be prepared to reject any rush to judgment.

Anyone wishing to get a copy of the DOE’s presentation regarding the proposed changes to SHSAT may contact my office by phone at (212) 288-4607 or by email at seawrightr@ nyassembly.gov. # NYS Assembly Member Rebecca Seawright represents the 76th District.

10

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

NOV/DEC 2018

Town Hall Honors Laurie Anderson, Bob Hurwitz, and Charles Hull at Its 97th Gala

(L-R) Robert Hurwitz, Laurie Anderson, Charles Hull, Tom Wirtshafter

By LYDIA LIEBMAN The Town Hall celebrated its 97th Gala Celebration recently at the Princeton Club in New York City. The momentous occasion honored three incredible artistic pioneers with The Town Hall Friend of the Arts Award: Multimedia Performance Artist Laurie Anderson, TheaterWorksUSA Co-Founder Charles Hull, and former Nonesuch Records President Robert Hurwitz.

The evening began with an exceptional performance featuring a virtuosic trio consisting of Israeli clarinetist Anat Cohen, Argentinean vocalist Sofia Rei, and Colombian harpist Edmar Castañeda. Each respected musicians in their own right, together the three of them brought the audience to their feet with stirring renditions of songs that originated in Latin America by composers such as Violeta Parra, Cartola, and Astor Piazzolla, among others. All in attendance were stunned to learn that this was the trio’s first performance together.

The award ceremony portion commenced across the hall in the dining room. Before the award presentations got underway, the Town Hall President Tom Wirtshafter said a few words. He thanked Town Hall’s many donors and supporters and quickly introduced President Emeritus Marvin Leffler to the podium. He remarked on how this year celebrates Leffler’s 40th anniversary of service to Town Hall resulting in 10,000 days of work at the organization. Leffler came to the microphone and brought the attendees to laughter multiple times with several witty jokes. He spoke about the exciting future in store at the organization and about the importance of supporting it. “I am very excited about what lies ahead in 2021

when we celebrate our 100th anniversary! Our programming grows more exciting each day,” he said.

The first award was presented to Charles Hull. Hull founded TheaterWorksUSA with the late Jay Harnick and Bob Adams in 1961.

Under his 39-year tenure, TheaterWorksUSA grew to become America’s largest and foremost Equity theatre for young audiences. Upon receiving the award, Hull expressed his astonishment at having been considered. “I have roamed the halls of Town Hall for about half a century and looking at the pictures of all the greats on the walls, the idea of my picture joining them is just overwhelming.”

The second award of the evening was presented to NoneSuch Records President Emeritus Robert Hurwitz. Robert Hurwitz was at the helm of NoneSuch for 32 years. To this day, NoneSuch Records is one of the most diverse and influential record labels in the world boasting a roster of incredible creative talents including Bill Frisell, Steve Reich, Randy Newman, Pat Metheny, Lake Street Dive and co-honoree Laurie Anderson. Because of their close working relationship over the years, Anderson gave an introduction to Hurwitz. She praised him for all the work he has done for music and spoke about their collaborations over the years. In his acceptance speech, Hurwitz talked about his affection for Town Hall and how his first concert there, a John Coltrane tribute, showed him the beauty of New York.

The final award was then presented to Laurie Anderson. Anderson has been active on the arts scene since the early 1970s. She is a true renaissance woman; she is a visual artist, poet, composer, photographer, filmmaker, electron-

Harpist Edmar Castañeda

Clarinetist Anat Cohen and vocalist Sofia Rei

ics whiz, vocalist, and multi-instrumentalist.

She has performed at Town Hall for over four decades and has even released a recording recorded live there titled Live in New York.

Robert Hurwitz introduced Anderson this time around and he profiled her long and diverse career. For her acceptance speech, in signature Laurie Anderson fashion, she sang to the audi-

ence using a “pillow speaker” in her mouth. The resulting sound was something like a violin.

The joyous evening was filled with warmth and appreciation for the venerable institution that is Town Hall. The new season of programming boasts an incredible lineup including Audra McDonald, Esperanza Spalding, Abbi Jacobson, and others. #

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

BOOK REVIEW

Children of Monsters:

An Inquiry into the Sons and Daughters of Dictators Children of Monsters: An Inquiry into the Sons and Daughters of Dictators

By Jay Nordlinger

Encounter Books, 268 pp., $16.99 [orig. pub. 2015].

By JOAN BAUM, Ph.D. This may not be the kind of book to try to read in one sitting. What’s the cognitive equivalent of eyes glazing over that would describe taking in 20 chapters of accumulated horror, sadism and suspended morality by the children and sometimes grandchildren of pathological political leaders of the 20th and 21st century? Even if, as here, author Jay Nordlinger, senior editor at National Review, invokes a breezy, conversational style, interjecting into his unusual inquiry a personal, incredulous, often witty sense of disbelief.

Impressively, Nordlinger’s done extensive research, reading about and interviewing defectors, analysts, witnesses, friends, former friends. “I have used everything I can, everything possible: every scrap or remark or hint” — biographies, memoirs, histories, interviews.

“Around dictators and their children, rumors swirl, of course . . . In my job as scavenger, I often asked, ‘What smells right?’

Your nose is an important organ in composing a book such as this.” He charmingly apologizes for relying on words such as “apparently, evidently, reportedly, seemingly,” but guesswork was inevitable, he says, though he deigns to draw conclusions from unverifiable hypotheses.

Though the book covers the progeny and the extent to which the children were chips off the old bestial block, it’s impossible to know how many children each dictator had. Not the conjugal or monogamous types, the dictators had multiple wives and many mistresses. A lot of information about their families, legit and illegit, remains unknown.

Did Hitler have a child, and did that child have a child — both of whom, Nordlinger points out, look like him (check out chapter one)?

The list of infamous parents includes, in order and by region, Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Stalin, Tojo, Mao, Kim, Hoxha, Ceausescu, Duvalier, Castro, Qaddafi, Assad, Saddam, Khomeini, Mobutu, Bokassa, Amin, Mengistu, Pol Pot. With pictures of each, sometimes with their fathers, tyrants’ children get space according

to how “interesting” or “important” they are and how much can be learned about them.

Svetlana Stalin gets a lot of attention because she wrote memoirs and because she has been written about, especially when she became an American citizen (she registered with the Republican Party and donated money to the National Review).

Nordlinger repeatedly notes that succession was only through the male line but that sons and daughters sometimes exerted great power, especially if they stayed on or remained tight lipped after their fathers had their siblings and in-laws killed (see particularly Edda Mussolini in Italy and two Hussein daughters in Iraq).

Tellingly, as Nordlinger notes, mass executions did not dissuade most children from keeping

the family name (recognition breeds power) or from declaring defensively, sometimes proudly, most always ambivalently, abiding love for their big-time murdering parent.

In the Foreword, Nordlinger says the idea of the book came to him in 2002 when he was visiting Albania for the State Department. Enver Hoxha had been the Communist dictator (and head of secret police) from 1944 until his death in 1985, a man who “achieved an almost perfect tyranny. No one could breathe.” Nordlinger got to wondering about what it must be like “to bear a name synonymous with oppression,

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

11

Akhil Reed Amar Gives Talk on the Supreme Court at Roosevelt House

By LYDIA LIEBMAN Recently, Professor Akhil Reed Amar gave a compelling talk at the Roosevelt House titled “Filling the Court: From Midnight Judges to Court Packing to Garland, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh. Amar, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science, Yale University, is considered one of the country’s pre-eminent constitutional scholars. He has taught at Yale University for over 30 years and counts several prominent figures as his students including senators Chris Coons and Cory Booker as well as Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

In his informative talk, which was given around the time of the controversial Kavanaugh hearings, Amar discussed the history of filling vacancies on the Supreme Court, which were often politically motivated.

He talked at length about the historical significance of “transformative presidents” and how they shaped the court. He highlighted the great confrontations including Marbury v.

Madison, Abraham Lincoln v. Roger Taney, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s court packing plan and Obama’s fight about Obamacare in the face of a basically “Reagan court”. The relationship between the executive and the judiciary has been, according to Amar, often fraught with controversy and conflict.

He spent some time discussing the process of picking judges and replenishing the judiciary. “The constitution makes the process of judicial selection very political and then it provides judicial independence through tenure thereafter,” he said. He then went on to highlight the history of judicial appointments starting with George Washington’s decision to appoint all Federalists to the first Supreme Court, to John Adams’ attempt to pack the lower federal courts and reduce the number of Supreme Court seats from six to five, followed by Thomas Jefferson’s attempt

to unpack the court by repealing the expansion of the judiciary. Interestingly, Amar explained, Roosevelt, who was elected primarily to “fix things”, was unable to make an impact on the court during his first term because there were no retirements on the court. FDR attempted to grow the court to 10 seats, but was jammed.

In response, he nominates Justice Hugo Black, who made a huge impact on transforming American constitutional law.

“When you jam a president, he may find ways of jamming you back,” he said. He explained the nature of the appointments game, which does have an advantage toward the president. He expressed his opinion on the Merrick Garland case and said that while he is a Democrat, he does not believe that the seat was “stolen”, as many Democrats claim.

“Democrats won the presidency in 2012, but Republicans won the senate in 2014. If you don’t win the senate along with the presidency, it’s not clear that you’re going to get your picks,” he said.

After giving historical context, Amar took a number of questions. He was asked his opinion on whether judges should have political experience or a political background, his thoughts on the Kavanaugh debacle, and Trump’s court picks. One particularly interesting question regarded the current state of affairs and why the Supreme Court nomination process seems to be more divisive than ever. “Was it always like this?” asked an audience member. Amar gave some historical context, which showed that most presidents have generally elected justices that resemble their own political party. However, in these modern times, intense political polarization has added to the divisiveness, as has “the rise of primaries and Twitter”. The discussion was highly enlightening and educational; every seat was filled. #

murder, terror, and evil.” The idea percolated and so did his list of dictators, but he kept it to 20, adding or subtracting “a couple of brutes.”

He notes also that the dictators “are not equal in their monstrousness . . . Mobutu of Zaire, for example, was an angel compared with his friend and neighbor Bokassa.” In the dictator business, Nordlinger sardonically adds, “we sometimes grade on a curve. Franco was a lamb compared with our genocidal monsters: Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, et al.” In short, there were monster sons of monster fathers, such as Vasily Stalin, Nico Ceausescu, the Qaddafi, Assad and Saddam Hussein boys. But there was also a smattering of so-called “comparatively normal people” and a couple who did break away (Svetlana, and Alina Fernández, Castro’s daughter).

Nordlinger’s conclusion is that the children, historical footnotes, were / are nonetheless still human beings “born into a very strange

position.” And so, he admits to writing a “psychological study” in part, even as he deigns to adjudicate between nature and nurture. Many of the children vacillate or deny, subject to opportunism, wealth, ambivalence, the perks of power, not to mention the influence of their fathers’ collaborators and of well-wishers from the grisly past.

Of course, the key questions are: Why the book and what should readers take away from it? Nordlinger reminds readers that he is reflecting on “the children’s hour,” not the tyrants themselves; that most of the children were “bit players on the stage of history”; and that denying one’s parents is difficult. Even Svetlana has fond memories. One should note, however, that in the three years since Children of Monsters was first published, North Korea and Syria have horrifyingly occupied the world stage in new ways and that Fidel is dead. Their chapters particularly, therefore, give pause. #

12

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

NOV/DEC 2018

Restorative Justice in Schools Can Offer Teachable Moments

By DANA STAHL & ADAM SUGERMAN

In most of the US before the 1970s, it was a common practice to punish students who misbehaved or underperformed with a spanking, a whack with a wooden ruler or paddle, and for repeat offenders, public scolding, detention, suspension, and expulsion. Other punitive measures — retributive justice based on forms of punishment such as close encounters with the criminal justice system — became more common, and in most cases, didn’t resolve many issues. Not for the victims. Not for the offenders. And certainly not for the system.

Recidivism became more commonplace. A school-to-prison pipeline ossified.

In the subsequent decades, systems of distributive justice involving “treatment” of offenders became more established as more state departments of education reassessed their corrective practices. By 2000, 28 states abolished corporal punishment, but many parents considered that the pendulum swung too far in the other direction when school-based offenses were punished “too leniently” and offending students didn’t “learn their lesson.” As a result, the school-toprison pipeline became more entrenched than ever.

A third way is taking hold: Restorative Justice. The term refers to the approach in which the victim, offender, and other people

affected by the incident (i.e., bystanders) get involved in the resolution with the help of a facilitator. Forms of restorative justice — albeit with a different name — have been used successfully in Africa, the Americas, with the Maori of New Zealand.

Within our schools, restorative justice is becoming a positive alternative to punitive measures typically implemented for inappropriate behavior or conduct, offering teachable moments to students. The National Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL) offers programs aligned with grade specific learning objectives promoting character development through a social-learning curriculum. The goal of restorative justice is to repair students’ standing in the community so they can move forward with their peers.

According to former Navajo Supreme Court Chief Justice Robert Yazzie, restorative justice is embedded in the concepts of Diné culture.

He states, “Navajo justice is a sophisticated system of egalitarian relationships where group solidarity takes the place of force and correction. In it, humans are not in ranks or status classifications from top to bottom. Instead, all humans are equals and make decisions as a group. There is no precise term for ‘guilty’ in the Navajo language. The word guilt implies a moral fault that commands retribution. It is a

nonsense word in Navajo law due to the focus on healing, integration with the group, and the end goal of nourishing ongoing relationships with the immediate and extended family, relatives, neighbors, and community.” In this light, Diné justice prevails as the goal is to negotiate a resolution to the satisfaction of all participants.

A restorative justice session could take place as conversations with as few as three participants: the offender, the victim, and the facilitator. But it also takes place with larger groups, including people who didn’t join directly in the dispute.

Jennifer Gonzalez, a former teacher and at present, the editor-in-chief of the website Cultof-Pedagogy, reinforces the importance of a circular approach in restorative justice both in its concepts and its members. “Pulling groups of people together into circles for conversations is one of the most recognizable features of schools that have adopted restorative practices.

The circles can take many forms; meditation circles when a problem needs to be addressed, healing circles when group members are hurting or grieving, or circles that form just for dialogue and storytelling. When circles are a regular part of the school culture, they give students a vehicle for communicating when problems arise, rather than handling them in less constructive ways.”

There are several conditions for restorative

justice sessions to meet success in the school setting. Each stakeholder —victim, offender, witnesses and other bystanders, classmates, and educators — must not feel oppressed to communicate, or feel threatened in any way; all participants must be willing to listen and talk calmly; a program must take into consideration the needs and empowerment of each stakeholder in the affected communities; and processes must never impose punishments that exceed the maximum punishment that is stated in its school policies.

In certain egregious instances, suspensions and expulsions are needed. But alternative solutions to suspensions and expulsions are crucial because students often make poor decisions and their social judgment is not sound.

After all, students are children, and educational institutions need to embrace these situations as teachable moments, not punitive ones.

Although restorative justice has its roots in the criminal justice system, it goes far beyond dealing with offenders and the mainstream society. The punitive approach does not repair the harm that was done. By removing the punitive component from the offense and emphasizing restorative options, “the debt that is owed to society, and the individual harmed is repaid,” according to Gonzalez. In essence, this is how restorative justice in schools can offer teachable moments. #

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

LAW & EDUCATION

THE ETHICS COLUMN

Harvard Freshman Selection Litigation

DNA Turns Dangerous

By ARTHUR KATZ, JD Earlier this year, I briefly wrote about one aspect of the current litigation instituted by the group “Students for Fair Admissions” (the “SFA”) against Harvard College [See the June/ July, 2018 issue of Education Update for background information concerning the litigation].

The focus of this earlier article was the confidentiality of college applications. However, the principal issue of the litigation is whether affirmative action can be utilized as part of the admissions process, by an educational institution receiving federal funding, in order to achieve the type of diverse community which the institution believes is a necessary part of its educational mission.

The use of affirmative action has been previously discussed [See the September/October, 2013 and the January/February, 2016 issues of Education Update] in connection with another litigation also sponsored by the SFA. In “Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin”, the conservative Justices then on the U.S. Supreme Court raised serious questions regarding the need for continued use of affirmative action as part of the holistic approach being taken by most colleges, including Harvard, in determining the make-up of its entering freshman class. At that time, the Court permitted the continued use of affirmative action provided that “strict scrutiny” was utilized. Strict scrutiny permits the use of affirmative action if a showing can be made that other permitted techniques would not accomplish the desired objective.

The SFA structured the Harvard litigation in an attempt to, again, bring the issue of affirmative action before the Supreme Court at a time when the Court has become more conservative.

As a result, there is a possibility that the use of affirmative action in the college selection process may be coming to an end.

The underlying facts of the case are interesting. In essence, the argument by the SFA is that Asian-American applicants to Harvard are discriminated against and held to a higher standard, in favor of both Caucasians as well as other minority groups. The SFA says that proof of such discrimination is that the percentage of Asian-Americans admitted to Harvard is significant less that the percentage of AsianAmericans applying to Harvard with high academic achievements.

Although 22.9 percent of this year’s freshman class at Harvard is Asian-American, if only academic achievements were considered, over 40 percent of the class would be Asian-American.

At the same time, 15.2 percent of Harvard’s freshman class is African-American and 12.3 percent is Latino. Harvard contends (and the SFA appears to agree) that if race were not able to be considered during the admissions process, the percentage of African-American admittees would significantly decline.

Arthur Katz, JD

In recruiting for its freshman class, more than 40,000 completed applications were received

by Harvard for approximately 2,000 slots and, of this pool of applicants, over 3,400 had perfect SAT math scores, over 2,700 had perfect SAT verbal scores and over 8,000 of the domestic applicants had perfect high school grade point averages.

What complicates the matter is that, although approximately 2,000 freshman slots are available annually, certain applicants are favored in the first instance, as Harvard has a legacy system which significantly increases the probability of admission to qualified students whose parents or other relatives attended Harvard, as well as to students whose family have made, or are expected to make, significant monetary contributions to Harvard, to students of “exceptional athletic ability” and to students who are children of faculty members. These favored groups, which currently are overwhelmingly Caucasian, constitute nearly 40 percent of the high school seniors ultimately admitted to Harvard.

Although there have been several weeks of oral testimony, both Harvard and the SFA are relying upon, and have submitted to the District Court, a voluminous expert economic analysis of the underlying admissions data to bolster their respective claims. Fortunately, these submissions (with minor redactions) are part of the court record, are publicly available and are an interesting read. However, different conclusions are reached depending on the particular study.

The Harvard study claims that the SFA study is flawed, while the SFA study argues that Harvard’s conclusions contain an unconscious bias against Asian-Americans. Harvard alleges that the SFA does not understand the full nature of its selection process, which includes not just

13

By JACOB M. APPEL, MD JD One of the consequences of being convicted of a felony, or even merely arrested in many states, is that one is required to provide a DNA sample to authorities. These samples are recorded electronically in the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), a national database that can be used to solve additional crimes.

At present, more than 17 million offenders have their DNA stored in this way. What few laypeople realize is that these samples differ fundamentally from those used by genetics researchers or consumer genealogy companies like 23andMe. CODIS relies on the use of short tandem repeats (STRs). These distinctive, non-coding portions of the genome are highly effective in identifying particular individuals — the equivalent of genetic fingerprints — but they do not code for specific traits. In contrast, most genealogical and medical research databases rely upon full-genome sequencing or aggregates of single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNPs) that do code for expressed genes. Among the advantages of (STRs) is that they can reveal identities while protecting medical privacy. The police can use CODIS to determine whether a suspect visited a crime scene or committed a sexual assault — but not if he is predisposed to develop diabetes or Alzheimer’s disease. Until now.

A rather unsettling paper published by Michael Edge of Stanford University and colleagues in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences last year reported that STR sequences in the CODIS could be correlated with those in other data sets, even if none of the genetic data overlapped directly. It turns out at certain STRs are consistently located close enough to coding sections of the genome that researchers — with enough time and effort — can trace CODIS data back to specific individuals in other data sets and, in theory, then use this data to discover medical information about suspects. Moreover, Yaniv Erlich of the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research has shown that these suspects do not need to have uploaded their own DNA to commercial sites for this to prove possible. If relatives

upload DNA — possibly kin as distant as third cousins — that may be enough to identify a suspect. Once identified, this suspect’s medical secrets can be unlocked.

Why does this matter? One of the legal and ethical justifications for a wide range of forensic uses for genetic material — from the CODIS to DNA dragnets — is that the privacy risks to innocent suspects are truly minimal. Providing DNA samples to the police, the argument runs, is merely a hassle — unless you’ve committed an unsolved crime. But Edge’s research reveals far more danger in this process. No scientific limitations keep the authorities from using that same DNA sample for predicting health risks; more alarming, hackers could breach that database and reveal the linked results on the Internet.

None of this is reason to abandon forensic databases entirely. Yet existing policies were predicated on certain expectations of privacy.

If modern science renders those expectations obsolete, a strong argument exists for revisiting these policies — to reevaluate the ethics of when and why to require such samples in the context of unforeseen and newly-discovered risks. #

a review of academic performance from an academically exceptional pool of applicants, but also is based upon a variety of non-academic factors. The SFA contends that certain of such non-academic factors permit a bias to develop and that this bias has disadvantaged Asian-Americans. Harvard has countered that the economic study submitted on behalf of the SFA fails to include some non-academic factors as they are much harder to quantify, and that the SFA study does not adequately consider the overall context of an applicant’s application, such as the quality of the applicant’s high school, the applicant’s socioeconomic circumstances and the resources and opportunities that may, or may not, be available to the applicant,

and concludes that the SFA study is too weak to provide reliable statistical evidence of bias.

Thus, there is no certainty as to how the District Court will rule but, whatever the ruling, it is probable that the result will be appealed and may slowly wind its way to the U.S. Supreme Court. However, and in the interim, the litigation has revealed a significant amount of information concerning the admission process at Harvard, how applications are considered, the preference given to legacy and others applicants, and the imperfections of the process. # Arthur Katz, a corporate attorney, is Of Counsel to the New York City law firm of Otterbourg, P.C.

Jacob M. Appel, MD JD

14

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

College of Staten Island

Touro College

lence. Our new strategic plan, “Opportunity to Ascend,” developed through a rigorous campus-wide process with inputs from all corners, set us on this path. It comprises six priorities that I reference here to illustrate how they are all a part of the College’s new trajectory.

“Opportunity to Ascend” has a dual meaning.

First, since our earliest days, our mission has been arrow-straight: to provide access to the highest quality education and the “Opportunity to Ascend.” However, as an institution we also have that same opportunity: As a “Destination Campus” with a commitment to “Global Engagement” where students from all over the world will want to come and study and faculty will want to spend their careers.

We have a world-class faculty equal to those at a Top R1 Research University. But we are different. We value “Scholarship Driven Education,” meaning that whenever you go into the lab of Dan McCloskey, one of the top 100 young scientists in the entire country as recognized by President Obama, you find undergraduate students helping out with the scholarship. That is something that does not occur at those R1 institutions.

One of our celebrated poets, Patricia Smith, represents the true depth of faculty excellence found at CSI. Patricia was named a 2018 Pulitzer Prize finalist for her latest collection of poetry, Incendiary Art: Poems. This honor followed a series of other prominent awards she received, including the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for poetry, and the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. Additionally, Patricia’s CSI colleague, Tyehimba Jess, who was the 2017 Pulitzer Prize winner for poetry for his book, Olio, was the recipient of a 2018 Guggenheim Fellowship. Both Patricia and Tyehimba were the main catalysts for The New York Times feature, “How CUNY Became Poetry U.” Like Dan, both are involved in teaching undergraduates, and Tyehimba makes special requests to teach freshmen students.

We are a part of Staten Island, not apart from Staten Island through “Borough Stewardship.”

We are in a unique role to work with the public and private sectors on the island to provide opportunities to students to aid in workforce development, and to help with initiatives to

and medicine.

Touro’s researchers continue this tradition simultaneously advancing their fields and contributing to social good through studies as diverse as the use of marijuana in the treatment of Parkinson’s symptoms, whether volunteering benefits older adults and behavioral risk of diabetes in the Orthodox community. We strive to become a university with a vibrant research culture that produces high-quality, impact-driven research underpinned by technology and creativity.

Community Service Opportunities The influence of these values can be felt throughout our programs, but especially within our health, counseling and education-related graduate schools, where we provide ongoing opportunities for community service. Each of our school communities buzzes with the energy of students who are actively pursuing knowledge in the lecture halls, while also gaining experiential wisdom amid rich volunteer opportunities beyond the classroom.

For example, students at our medical and health sciences schools complete community services programs as a requirement for graduation. Opportunities range from teaching senior citizens to use technology at nursing homes to using therapeutic horsemanship to help children with disabilities.

As students prepare for graduation, we help them launch careers that are both personally rewarding and beneficial for society at large.

Jewish and universal values are aligned to educate thoughtful citizens dedicated to building a

continued from page 2

continued from page 2

improve “civic prosperity” (jobs plus quality of life). Consider our new Tech Incubator in St. George on the North Shore of Staten Island, which, in its first cohort, has taken in three businesses that want to be on the North Shore: One was founded by a student, one by an international team, and one by entrepreneurs in Manhattan.

Because of our commitment to “Student Success” our students go to the best med schools and law schools, serve in the most prestigious not-for-profits, and get the best jobs on Wall Street and elsewhere. In the past several years, we have ranked in the top 20 in the entire nation

www. EducationUpdate.com Scan QR Code with your Smartphone

Follow our tweets on the latest news, profiles and interviews in education:

@EducationUpdate

responsive and responsible society. Our graduates gain the knowledge needed to succeed in their chosen careers and develop a commitment to the communities in which they live and work. Touro graduates include public service leaders — judges, educators, and social service innovators — as well as leaders in New York’s business and finance sectors.

National Leader in Healthcare Education As we look to the future, we continually assess student and societal needs as well as emerging job opportunities. Nowhere is this more evident than in our medical and health sciences programs. Some of the best job opportunities currently exist in the healthcare field, and Touro is fast becoming one of the largest healthcare educational systems in the U.S. Two and a half years ago, we opened a new dental school — the first in New York State in 50 years. Interest is high, enrollment is full and a state-of-the-art dental health training facility was built to educate the students and serve the community.

Integrated Honors Tracks and Medical Honors Pathway programs provide opportunities for high-achieving students to combine undergraduate studies with a direct pathway to professional education.

There is a Jewish phrase, “from generation to generation” that conveys our purpose — to sustain Jewish traditions and values and to make the world a better place for the next generation.

As we look to our future, we are informed by our heritage, which points us toward knowledge, compassion, and social justice. # Dr. Alan Kadish is president of the Touro College & University Systems. for taking students from the lowest two quintiles of wealth and moving them to the upper levels.

Our alumni make in the top 15% of salaries as the graduates from any institution in the country.

We quite literally make the American dream real for our students.

For example, History MA student Peter Scasny has been awarded a Fulbright to Italy, where he will be teaching English. At the annual American Marketing Association’s Collegiate Case Competition, one of the premiere marketing competitions in the country, our Marketing team took second place among more than 100 teams across North America. They narrowly missed first place to the team from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, one of the top business schools in the country.

And we do all this by providing access to all. We provide over $60M in access financial aid every year from Federal Pell, State Tap, Excelsior, and private sources, plus $15M in federally insured student loans as a direct lending institution. There is a difference between federal financial aid direct loans and what many call loans from private banks — that sometimes puts us at odd with private banks, but is the right thing to do. This means that 60% of our students pay no tuition. That’s right no tuition; so, 75% graduate debt-free, and those that do borrow graduate with an average of just $8,000 in debt.

The national average is almost $40,000.

So what is missing? As our State budget

■

NOV/DEC 2018

Pathways to Progress

continued from page 2

are shared and evaluated. At these retreats, collaborative group discussions consider current issues in higher education and make informed recommendations for a path forward.

To date, our collaborative action-oriented approach to planning has led to a number of successes: • St. John’s enrolls the largest cohort of firstyear undergraduate students among all Catholic colleges and universities in the nation, with an annual average enrollment of almost 3,150 first-year students for the past four years.

• Retention rate of first- to second-year students increased to an average of 84% during the last three years — a nearly five percentage point increase from previous years.

• 182 new faculty members have been hired since 2014.

• Modern teaching and learning technology tools were installed in more than 80% of classrooms, and state-of-the-art laboratories were built for various professional programs.

• Record fundraising levels have been achieved with the support of alumni and friends.

At St. John’s, we plan and prioritize our actions in response to the challenges presented by our mission and shared vision. The promise and pride of a St. John’s University education inspire and guide our efforts on our steady pathway to progress. # Dr. Conrado “Bobby” Gempesaw is the President of St. John’s University.

ADVERTISE IN

Education Update in PRINT

& ONLINE www.EducationUpdate.com Choose an animated or stationary online banner ad.

Call (917) 375-0497 for rates. declines, as all state budgets have for higher education, we have to be very mindful of “Resource Management.” We simply do not have the ability to make our campus as beautiful as we would like or to provide incentives to support and retain those world-class faculty.

Public support is critical to our mission and to our strategic plan and it does more than put plaques on benches or other items on campus — it gives us the money to buy and install such things, as well as providing additional support.

By buying a bench, coming to our gala, and offering other gifts, the public is helping us create a community, a beautiful Destination Campus and an opportunity for our students to Ascend. # Dr. William Fritz is the President of the College of Staten Island.

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

15

Windward Teacher Training Institute Windward Teacher Training Institute (WTTI) provides yearround professional development based on scientifically validated research in child development, learning theory, and pedagogy.

Courses, workshops, and lectures address a broad range of developmental and curricular topics appropriate for both mainstream and remedial settings.

The Institute serves as a resource for educators and professionals in allied disciplines, such as speech and language therapists and psychologists, as well as for families.

The goal of WTTI is to disseminate reliable and practical information for those seeking to enhance their knowledge and expertise.

COMMUNITY LECTURE: Beyond the Buzzwords of Grit and Resilience November 1, 2018 • 7:30 pm FREE TO ATTEND RESERVE YOUR SEAT at

Register now for Fall and Winter Classes:

THEWINDWARDSCHOOL .ORG / LECTURE

C L A S S E S AT W T T I W E S T C H E S T E R :

Syllables Are the Key: The Basics of Language Structure Through Syllabication Saturday, November 17, 2018 • 9:00 am – 1:00 pm NEW

Academic Language: It’s Not Plain English! Monday, January 14, 2019

•

4:00 – 6:30 pm

Strategies for Improving Students’ Math Skills Two Wednesdays: January 16, 23, 2019 • 4:00 – 6:30 pm Mindfulness and ADHD: Practical Tools for Daily Life Thursday, February 7, 2019 • 4:00 – 6:00 pm C L A S S E S AT W T T I M A N H AT TA N :

Executive Function Skills in Children: What You Need to Know and Why It Matters Tuesday, November 27, 2018 • 4:00 – 6:00 pm Expository Writing Instruction: Part Two – Primary Thursday, November 29, 2018 • 4:00 – 6:00 pm Language Development and Early Literacy: Building Phonological Awareness Skills Monday, December 3, 2018 • 4:00 – 6:00 pm Multisensory Reading Instruction: PAF Part I –Section 2 Five Wednesdays: January 9, 16, 23, 30, February 6, 2019 • 9:00 am – 1:00 pm Dyslexia: What Is It, Really? Thursday, January 17, 2019 • 4:00 – 6:00 pm Expository Writing Instruction: Part One – Section 2 Three Thursdays: February 14, 28, March 7, 2019 • 9:00 am – 2:30 pm

For more information, visit: thewindwardschool.org/wtti facebook.com/WindwardTeacherTrainingInstitute

Be informed.

Be inspired.

twitter.com/WindwardTTI

Transform lives.

16

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

NOV/DEC 2018

Humpback Whales Feast in NYC

Humpback whale breaching off of NYC waters

By DR. MERRYL KAFKA NYC has been touted as one of the food capitals of the world, and for the past eight years humpback whales can now be added to the list of regular diners! These majestic marine mammals have been visiting our waters to feast upon the millions of pounds of menhaden, or bunker, an oily forage fish that abound in our offshore waters.

In the spring the humpback whales begin

award Award Winner

www.EducationupdatE.com

Volume XII, No. 1 • New York City • SEPTEMBER 2006

FoR PaRENTS, EduCaToRS & STudENTS

Back-to-School 2006

their long migration from the Caribbean waters, where they mate and give birth, and travel about 1,500 miles to the colder nutrientrich waters of the North Atlantic, where food is abundant. The Caribbean may be beautiful, warm and crystal clear, but that is the color of emptiness; nutrient-poor waters with little plankton cannot support large schools of fishes. Hence the whales’ annual migration is simply to get as fat as they can in NYC, feed-

SUBSCRIBE to

Education Update Only $30 Per Year Name: _____________________________

rt

ii)

(pa

SP

EDUCATION

PRSRT STD. u.s. postage paid permit No.500 VooRHees, NJ

L

ECIA

Address: _____________________________ ______________________________________

City: ____________________ State: ________ Zip: __________ Payment Method: ❐ Check

❐ Credit Card

Credit Card (Please circle one):

AMEX

VISA

MC

Card Number: __________________________________________ Expiration Date: _________________________________________ Signature: ______________________________________________ Please make checks payable to EDUCATION UPDATE, INC. Mail to: Education Update Subscriptions, 695 Park Avenue, Ste. E1509, New York, NY 10065 or call (917) 375-0497.

(L-R) Merryl Kafka holding baleen, used for filter feeding, and a sperm whale tooth

ing on thousands of fish per day and storing that energy for the long journey back home.

Although a slow migration, ranging about 1–5 miles per hour, they do socialize and rest in a semi-sleeping behavior called “logging”.

Why semi-sleeping? Whales must remember to breathe, and rest one half of their brain at a time while sleeping. Their breathing is not on an automatic nervous system as ours is. We can get a good night’s sleep without remembering to breathe. When full of energy, humpbacks have an amazing display known as breaching, which is jumping out of the water into the air, lifting up to 40 tons of their body weight.

Little is know about why they jump. Scientists can make observations and easily record their behavior, but the reasons are speculative: communication, as in “here I am”, or ridding the body of ectoparasites, or perhaps simply jumping for joy as a way of expressing exuberance or play behavior.

The American Princess, docked in Breezy Point, Queens, is not only NYC’s sole whale watching vessel, but its entire crew is trained, tested and certified by Whalesense, in concert with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to assure that whalewatching enterprises use proper protocols to safeguard both the whales and the passengers, and commit to educational narratives. The American Princess is the platform from which Gotham Whale conducts its research by photographing the whales, documenting its behavior, and tracking its migration by latitude and longitudinal coordinates and communicating that to other whale (Cetacean) researchers along the Atlantic coastline. We also report whales that have been entangled with ghost nets or lose

fishing gear, or injured or struck by vessels.

They are indeed sleeping, feeding, and playing in traffic in one of the top ten busiest harbors in the world… the gateway to NYC! Photographing the whales’ tails is the key task, which identifies it as an individual. No two whales have the same tail or fluke pattern, much like a fingerprint. Gotham Whale, a not-for-profit organization founded by Paul Sieswerda, published the first NYC Humpback Whale Catalog with 70 fluke shots of individual whales taken by our dedicated staff photographer/curator Artie Raslich, and written

by Celia Ackerman, GW researcher and naturalist. Other staff members include Catherine Granton, GW researcher and naturalist, as well as citizen scientist passengers onboard The American Princess. All have contributed to a total inventory of over 90 individual humpback whales indentified.

Committed to education, conservation and research, the American Princess becomes a floating classroom with educators for a “Science at Sea” three-hour excursion.

Programs for teachers as a PD or for student field trips will provide first hand experience using oceanographic equipment, and exploring such topics as plankton, invertebrate zoology, whale biology, fish diversity, salt marsh ecology, and water chemistry. Come explore the wonders of the water world in our own backyard. The American Princess is a DOE vendor approved, insured vessel.# For information, contact Director of Education M. Kafka at Goodfishdr@aol.com, AmericanPrincessCruises.com, or Gothamwhale.org on Facebook for more information.

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

Assemblywoman Rebecca Seawright Celebrates Sgt. York’s Legacy Recently, East Side World War I Centennial Commemoration Committee held an exciting evening of music, film, and celebration at the Lycée Français de New York to remember Sergeant Alvin York. Sergeant Alvin York is one of the most decorated veterans of the First World War and York Avenue, which runs on Manhattan’s East Side, is named after him.

The evening featured a number of standout moments including a student musical performance led by Jacques LeTalon, music educator at the Lycée and a warm welcome delivered by Gale Brewer, Manhattan Borough President.

Assemblywoman Rebecca Seawright, cochair of ESWWICC, delivered some warm remarks as well. “We’ve always known York Avenue was special but wait until you see this movie tonight,” she said, “for those of you who don’t already know about Sergeant York, you’ll be even prouder to be associated with his name!” Assemblywoman Seawright followed her remarks by presenting co-chair Howard Teich with a special medallion with the New York State seal on behalf of the New York State Assembly. Teich then gave some informative background on Sergeant York’s accomplishments and told of how the East Side was involved in the First World War effort. He also recognized members of the committee and York Avenue business owners.

Harold Holzer took to the podium next to have a discussion with Retired Army Col. Gerald York, the late Alvin York’s grandson. Holzer is a highly respected and distinguished Lincoln Scholar and the Director of the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College. Holzer asked Col. York a number of interesting questions about his grandfather, the Alvin C. York Institute that

Rebecca A. Seawright

his grandfather founded, and the 1941 film Sergeant York. One of the most interesting tidbits was in regard to education. York’s grandson said, “Later in life, my grandfather was asked ‘what do you want to be remembered for?’ and he said, ‘I want to be remembered for bringing education to Tennessee.’” After their dialogue concluded, the film Sergeant York, which stars Gary Cooper as the titular character, was screened for the audience. A national rallying cry, the movie was the highest grossing film in 1941. #

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

17

Tips For Healthy Holiday Eating

By SAMANTHA NAZARETH, M.D. Moving into the holiday season sparks nostalgia of spending time with the family and enjoying festive parties at work. Unfortunately, with all of that good cheer, sometimes health goals fall by the wayside. I’ve gathered some tips to help you get through this holiday season to avoid overindulging.

Don’t arrive to a party or dinner hungry.

In anticipation of a large meal, sometimes we think it’s better to hold off eating until the main event. However, your body will go into overdrive and overeat once food becomes available. Treat these special days like any other day — eat regular portions before attending a holiday event. If you are feeling hungry, you can munch on a healthy snack that you keep in your bag, like nuts or raw veggies. This will prevent eating anything and everything in sight.

Follow the 2:1 rule — for every two healthy dishes you eat, one small unhealthy food can follow. Once at an event, it is hard not to eat some unhealthy items. Allow the chance to taste or have a sliver of the pie, if you have already eaten two servings of veggies/leafy greens. At least, you won’t feel as guilty eating dessert if some of it is balanced with beneficial and nutritious food items. Also, the two servings of vegetables and leafy greens serve as healthy fiber. Fiber keeps you feeling full, which will also prevent overeating the not-sogood food.

Move your body. Take a walk around the block or help clean up after eating. Do not go into complete relaxation mode and watch TV or go to sleep. Movement aids digestion. This small amount of exercise will also help to burn some calories your body needs to process.

Bring a healthy dish. Sometimes it is difficult to predict if healthy food options are available at an event. Most of the time it is expected to bring a dish to a person’s home

Samantha Nazareth, M.D.

anyway. Therefore, why not prepare and bring a healthy side dish? Some of my favorites include a homemade no-sugar cranberry sauce, roasted brussels sprouts, or baked carrots.

Be aware of mindful eating and slow down!

Begin with taking the time to savor each bite and chew slowly. Digestion starts right away in the mouth (your saliva has enzymes to help break down food). Also, the mechanical act of chomping and biting helps to break down the food to a smaller form. The purpose of slowly eating allows your brain to receive the signal from the stomach of “I am full” — a process that can take up to 20 minutes. # Any questions about gut health, wellness, or nutrition? Send them on Instagram or Twitter to @drsamnazareth.

A New President: Thomas Bailey Takes the Reins of Teachers College Thomas R. Bailey is the eleventh President of Teachers College, Columbia University. He has served on the College’s faculty for the past 27 years and is the George & Abby O’Neill Professor of Economics & Education.

An economist, with specialties in education, labor economics, and econometrics, Dr. Bailey is widely regarded as one the nation’s leading authorities on community colleges. In 1996, he established the Community College Research Center (CCRC) at Teachers College with support from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Since 1992 he also has been Director of the Institute on Education and the Economy (IEE) at the College. Dr. Bailey also has directed three National Centers funded by grants from the Institute of Education Sciences: the Center for Analysis of Postsecondary Education and Employment (CAPSEE), established in 2011,

and Center for the Analysis of Postsecondary Readiness (CAPR), established in 2014. From 2006 to 2012, Dr. Bailey directed another IES-funded center, the National Center for Postsecondary Research (NCPR).

Dr. Bailey and the CCRC won the Terry O’Banion Prize for Teaching and Learning at the annual conference for the League for Innovation in the Community College in 2013, and he was inducted as an AERA Fellow in the same year.

He has been a member of the National Academy of Education since 2012. In June 2010, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan appointed him chair of the Committee on Measures of Student Success, which developed recommendations for community colleges to comply with completion rate disclosure requirements under the Higher Education Opportunity Act. Dr. Bailey has also served as a consultant to many

public agencies and foundations as well as several state and local economic development and educational agencies.

Dr. Bailey earned his undergraduate degree in economics from Harvard University and his Ph.D. in labor economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His papers have appeared in a wide variety of education, policy-oriented, and academic journals, and he has authored or co-authored several books on the employment and training of immigrants and the extent and effects of on-the-job training.

Along with Shanna Smith Jaggars and Davis Jenkins, Dr. Bailey recently wrote Redesigning America’s Community Colleges: A Clearer Path to Student Success, which was published by Harvard University Press in 2015. Other books include Defending the Community College Equity Agenda (Johns Hopkins University Press,

2006), co-edited with Vanessa Morest, Working Knowledge: Work-Based Learning and Education Reform (Routledge, 2004), coauthored with Katherine Hughes and David Moore; Manufacturing Advantage (Cornell University Press, 2000), written with Eileen Appelbaum, Peter Berg, and Arne Kalleberg; and The Double Helix of Education and the Economy (IEE, 1992), co-authored with Sue Berryman.

Dr. Bailey is married to Dr. Carmenza L. Gallo, Associate Professor Emerita of Sociology at Queens College, the City University of New York. He has two daughters: Erika Bailey, the head of Voice and Speech at Harvard’s American Repertory Theatre; and TC alumna Daniela Bailey (M.A.’15, Private School Leadership), a social sciences teacher and class dean at the National Cathedra School in Washington, D.C. #

18

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

NOV/DEC 2018

The Oyster Queen: Restoring NYC’s Oyster Reefs

Teacher training session to measure the oysters

TENTATIVE REEF MONITORING SCHEDULE* Tanasia Swift, Oyster Reef Site Manager

By DR. MERRYL KAFKA, NYS MARINE EDUCATION ASSOCIATION (NYSMEA.ORG) Tanasia Swift, a regional site manager from The Billion Oyster Project (BOP), is like the Johnny Appleseed of the water world.

Her days are busy “planting” oyster reefs in NYC’s estuaries, from Coney Island to Sunset Park, Governor’s Island, and the Bronx River.

Tanasia is determined and excited, like a mother of millions, to see the success of her efforts.

She recruits and trains an army of students and teachers in the classroom and in the field to help establish reefs, and monitor and collect data on the growth of these incredible mollusks.

New York City and the American Oyster (Crassostrea virginica) have had a long and delicious, but difficult history, with oysters occupying over 350 square miles in the lower estuary of NYC. Historically, NYC provided the world with the best-tasting oysters, with many of them harvested right from Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal! Now the canal is one of the most polluted waterways in the country! By the early 1900s, over one billion oysters a year were being harvested from our local waters.

However, long-term threats such as overharvesting; rapidly growing urbanization; altering our coastlines from original marshlands and

rocky shores to hard edges, bulkheads and piers; dredging and landfill projects; and the discharge of pollution meant doomsday to our oyster beds.

Oysters were an integral part of our city: as a food source for all classes — the impoverished and the elite, with fine-dining oyster taverns, to basement “oyster cellars”, and street vendors selling them for a penny a piece; its lime-rich shells were ground up and burnt to construct Trinity Church; and Pearl Street is named for the huge piles of oysters left by the Lenape.

It is the intention of the Billion Oyster Project (BOP) to restore the oysters to NYC. Not as a food source due to polluted urban waters, but to have the oysters help restore a healthy waterway. The oyster is a living filter, each one filtering 50 gallons of water per day. Oysters feed on algae, and different species live in either fresh water, brackish, or salt-water ecosystems.

Creating oyster reefs also help to restore and maintain our biodiversity. The oyster is a keystone species, creating a habitat for many organisms that live on or near oyster beds and their associated complex community of microorganisms, worms, crabs, barnacles, sea stars, and fish.

Coney Island Creek is one of the newest installations, containing about 140,000 oysters,

Tuesday, November 6th, 11:30am–2:00pm: Canarsie Reef Wednesday, November 7th, 12:15pm–2:15pm: Coney Island Reef Friday, November 23rd, 12:30pm–2:30pm: Coney Island Reef *Note: Dates are tentative.

Please contact Tanasia Swift to RSVP. For information to participate in reef monitoring events, please contact our Queen of Oysters, Tanasia Swift: Tswift@nyharbor.org housed in 28 mesh cages called “files” to create a Community Oyster Reef. All Community Oyster Reefs must receive a permit from the Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC). The Coney Island Community Oyster Reef was permitted under the condition that the oysters must be removed before they become “market size” to avoid the public from poaching and eating oysters from the contaminated waters.

The reef is organized like a file cabinet, with each “file” or rack of oysters containing a number and a color code. The students at the Harbor School, located on Governor’s Island, is an important part of the behind-the-scenes development and maintenance of the oyster production. Students learn how to care for the planktonic oyster larvae, and the later stage called spat, that is ready to settle on a hard

substrate. The most preferred substrate for the spat to cement itself onto is an established living reef or a dead pile of oyster shells called cultch, creating a foundation for a new colony.

Many New York City restaurants donated over a million pounds of oyster shells to prepare for reef installations.

Tanasia uses the oysters as a way to teach students about the scientific method, science content and field skills, ecology of our local waters, and conservation ethics to preserve our marine heritage.

On the first day of our training, BOP Staff and 12 teachers eagerly appeared, representing schools from PS 288, John Dewey HS, Rachel Carson HS, Pace University, Bloomington School of Music, as well as staff from the Nature Conservancy and the Waterfront Alliance, allies in the BOP campaign. #

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

SPORTS

EDUCATION UPDATE

19

Townsend Harris Connects New York and Japan

McAdoo Family

Robert McAdoo IV A Tennis Star on the Rise

■

By DR. MARIKO FUKUOKA

By MIKE COHEN The wind was crackling and the air was chilly on a late autumn day at the tennis courts at Tamaques Park in Westfield, New Jersey. It was at the end of the long outdoor tennis season.

There was only one court being used. The sound of the ball being hit was barely audible in these conditions, but what could be heard was a booming voice.

“Way to go son, that’s it. Make good contact with that ball.” That familiar voice known throughout the courts in the area belongs to the tennis coach Robert McAdoo III. He was coaching his then 8-year-old son Robert McAdoo IV, who is now one of the top 9 yearolds in the country.

“What sets us apart is our pursuit of excellence,” said McAdoo III, who was a Division I tennis and basketball player at the University of North Carolina at Asheville. “We don’t let any obstacles stand in our way. I’m trying to teach my son to have a warrior mentality.”

Mac as he is known just finished third in the “Little Mo” National Tennis Tournament held in Austin, Texas. It’s no wonder that expectations are set so high for Mac. His paternal grandfather is the Hall of Fame basketball player, Bob McAdoo, and his maternal grandfa-

Hall of Fame basketball player Bob McAdoo (top left) with his son, Robert McAdoo III, and grandson, Robert McAdoo IV. McAdoo IV is one of the nation’s top 9-year-old tennis players.

ther, Tim Kakulia, was a top professional player from the Soviet Union in the early 70s.

Still, Mac is really just a regular kid from Mahwah, New Jersey who also enjoys school, playing basketball, joking around with his friends, and spending time with his mom, dad, and 4-year-old brother, Temo. By the way, his mom was also a tennis champion in college.

While the family has set very high goals for Mac as he makes his way through the world of junior tennis, they talk openly about having Mac some day be a professional player. Right now their main focus is on Mac’s development as an individual. The family values good character and attitude as much as winning tennis tournaments.

“I really enjoy playing on the tennis court because it’s where I feel special,” said Mac. # In addition to being the sports editor of Education Update, Mike Cohen is the founder/ director of Throwback Sports (a sports and educational program for children of all abilities). He can be reached at throwbacksports@ verizon.net.

As a historian, I have specialized in 19thcentury Japanese diplomatic history focusing on the period from the 1850s to the 1870s, the age of radical transition known as the Meiji Restoration. The arrival of a US squadron lead

by Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry and the forced opening of the country in 1853–54 triggered a series of drastic internal changes which ultimately led to the collapse of the Tokugawa Shogunate — which lasted for 265 years — and to the establishment of the reformative Meiji government in 1868.

My approach to this exciting and well-investigated field of traditional Japanese historiography has been to implement a multilingual angle. Having acquired a good command of English and German before commencing my Ph.D. studies, I decided, in my dissertation, to focus on a little-known Prussian expedition which was sent to Japan in 1860–61 to conclude its own commercial treaty, which was modeled on the previous US-Japan agreement negotiated by Townsend Harris in 1858. The Ph.D. thesis, which I completed in 2011 under the title The Prussian East-Asian Expedition and the Japanese Diplomacy in the Late Edo Era, was awarded the Nambara Shigeru Publication Prize, which is given annually to the most outstanding doctoral thesis in humanities and social sciences of the University of Tokyo, and was published by the University of Tokyo Press in 2013.

Working since 2014 as an associate professor at the National Museum of Japanese History, I have begun working on my next research project which aims to write a biography on the above-mentioned Harris, who played a key role in the history of Japan’s opening. He was a New York merchant who was sent to Japan

in 1856 as the U.S. Consul General, entrusted with a mission to replace Perry’s treaty with a real commercial treaty. He succeeded in this endeavor in 1858, signing the treaty of free trade with the shogunate, which became the model for treaties later signed between Japan and the West. By 1862, Harris was deeply involved in the radical transition of the country, from a state of seclusion to a society incorporated into world trade and diplomacy.

This is why I am now conducting research at the City College of New York from June to December 2018, where a number of handwritten letters of Harris are preserved. An analysis and evaluation of these documents along with many additional Harris-related sources preserved in Japan form the foundation of a more accurate biography on him. I also aim to incorporate other Western sources from the British, German, and Dutch, as I did in my first book in order to reconstruct the multinational diplomacy of that period in Japan.

Harris acted as the founder of the Free Academy of New York (today’s CCNY) in the 1840s. Thus, it will be another important task to assess its revolutionary meaning in the educational history of New York. How to integrate these different elements to a consistent life history of a unique American diplomat will be my mission for the coming years.

Though the book is going to be published first from the Japanese publisher Minerva Shobo, I aim to publish it in the English language. By doing this, I hope to build a bridge between Japanese and English-language historiography, like Townsend Harris did between Japanese and Western diplomacy in the 19th century. # Dr. Mariko Fukuoka, visiting researcher at CCNY, is an associate professor at the National Museum of Japanese History.

20

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

NOV/DEC 2018

THE MATH COLUMN

Motivating Mathematics Instruction Through Counterintuitive Everyday Experiences

Figure 1

Figure 2

Figure 3

Figure 4

Figure 5

Figure 6

By ALFRED POSAMENTIER, Ph.D. In recent years as technology has been advancing at lightning speed to provide ever more attractive and useful features that clearly affect our society, there is a very clear need to improve mathematics instruction in the schools and beyond. In the latter case, although the schools carry the official burden of providing the mathematical background that all students will need to move ahead in this ever-growing technological world, the burden goes beyond the school, specifically to the home environment as well.

First, there is the general misconception that parents should leave the teaching of mathematics to the schools. Although, clearly that is the schools’ responsibility, parents have a clear role to play there as well. This begins with the parents’ attitude towards mathematics. Typically, but not always, parents have a tendency to shirk away from mathematics, and by doing so, indicate to their students, who may be showing parents their day’s school work that their lack of competence in mathematics and perhaps lack of interest as well, guides them to focus more on the student’s work in other subjects, and by doing so downgrade the importance for mathematics. This already gives students a signal

that, if mathematics is seen as less important to parents, then it is likely not to be too important for them as well.

The parents influence can be best seen through the following anecdote: a student comes home with two test results: on a test in English a high grade was achieved, while on a test in mathematics a low grade was achieved.

A parent who may not have had a good school experience with mathematics instruction – something not uncommon for a large percentage of parents – might respond by lauding the student’s success on the English exam and perhaps placating the student with the poor performance on the mathematics exam. This sends a very detrimental signal. Namely, the parent’s expectation in math is at very low, and so the student can be satisfied performing at that level.

As a result, the student is not encouraged to improve performance on the math test and is likely to continue showing a weak mathematics background perceiving its acceptability by parents. In general, this would be a terrible way to guide a youngster; and is especially detrimental in today’s technological world.

Obviously, parents should encourage the student to perform better and never say to the student “I also didn’t do well in mathematics,

so don’t worry, as long as you passed the test, it’s OK.” This is just one important aspect that parents need to consider as they arear their students to be successful in school, and especially in mathematics. As a complete flip from this negative behavior, parents would do well to begin to fortify themselves with simple mathematics concepts and ideas that are not necessarily presented as part of the school curriculum.

Time spent preparing themselves with these new ideas can be internally rewarding, and externally it would be enriching their children’s mathematical experience, which should carry over as motivation for more actively learning the subject in school.

There are many resources for parents to build up this arsenal of ideas that will not only entertain the parents as they familiarize themselves with these new concepts, but they will also find it enjoyable to interact with their child on a mathematical topic that will engender amazement and demonstrate the power and beauty of mathematics. Before we present some of these ideas to merely whet the reader’s appetite, we need to address the role of the teacher in an analogous approach.

With the advent of teaching standards and a regular regiment of standardized testing,

mathematics teachers today are strongly guided to follow these guidelines and are subjected to related professional assessments. As a result, teachers rarely deviate from the prescribed curriculum, and moreover, they emphasize preparation for the various examinations which students will encounter along their instructional path. This obsessive instruction often time takes the “fun” out of teaching and learning mathematics. Just as we are advocating that parents familiarize themselves with some off-the-beaten-path mathematical concepts and ideas that can be highly motivating, teachers should take the time each week to deviate from the prescribed curriculum and expose students to these mathematical wonders. While presenting these typically not-well-known ideas, teachers have a tendency to generate special enthusiasm in their presentation, which further serves to motivate the students to the point where the time spent on this deviation is an investment whose dividends are seen as a more receptive learner for the required curriculum.

One of the most neglected aspect of teaching mathematics over the past several decades has been the teacher’s interest in seeking unusual aspects of mathematics that can be used to continued on page 26

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

Nitrogen: The Great Evil Incarnate...NOT Really!

Conor McGowan, US Geological Survey

Nitrogen is everywhere — around us and in us. The atmosphere is 79% nitrogen, and nitrogenous bases are a key component of the amino acids which compose our DNA. It is an essential nutrient for plant growth on which all life depends. Here on Long Island, nitrogen in estuarine waters spurs photosynthetic activity — the foundational process associated with coastal estuarine marine food chains, fostering one of the most productive ecosystems on Earth.

So nitrogen is an essential part of our lives.

But like everything, when there is an excess of nitrogen in specific forms, it can become a pollutant spurring on algal growth and potentially destroy our precious coastline.

Over the last five years, nitrogen has received a bad rap. Unfortunately, the solutions offered to combat excess nitrogen in our waters are either misguided or may be worse than the problem.

In 2009, distinguished scientist Dr. Ivan Valiela published a report identifying the contributions of nitrogen to coastal waters on Long Island. The report focused on four important causes to excess nitrogen: wastewater, agriculture, lawn-care run-off, and atmospheric conditions. The report prompted a lot of debate. Most of the environmental community in Suffolk County got behind the view that the main culprit was our septic tank system.

To be sure, septic systems are the easiest to blame. These systems are getting old and they do leak if they are not properly maintained.

Since there are fewer water sewerage treatment plants in Suffolk County as there are in Nassau

EDUCATION UPDATE

21

Molloy College’s CERCOM Field Station and an Ancient Mariner

On mud flats in Delaware Bay the morning after a full moon high tide spawn, thousands of horseshoe crabs wait on the mud flats for the high tide to return

Dr. JOHN TANACREDI

■

and NYC, the main attention over the last 5–10 years has been on the 390,000 homeowners with these individualized septic systems.

On the face of it, this sounds reasonable.

Septic systems on Long Island contribute an estimated 45% of the excess nitrogen to our waters. We will never totally eliminate some excess nitrogen from septic systems, but by my calculation with proper maintenance we could remove 75% of that. Carefully managed septic systems which are low in cost and require minimal maintenance can be highly beneficial without harming the ground water. They can also recharge the aquifer, and are especially effective in low-density areas where public sewers are neither available nor feasible.

Yet, the politically correct mantra for the last five years has been that septic systems leak and are the major factor contributing nitrogen to rivers, groundwater, estuaries and bays — contributing to massive, hazardous algal blooms, fish kills, and degraded water quality. The science suggests that these events as recently as 2015 and 2016 were due to a domino effect of physical and biological phenomena not completely caused by septic leak.

Nonetheless, DEC Regional Chief Peter Scully recently noted that the solution to our problems is to replace the 390,000 “aging” septic systems initially through a “lottery” where homeowners pay up to $25,000 to have new “more efficient” systems installed.

In addition, the Long Island Regional Planning Council has sought assistance in analyzing Nassau County surface water quality data with the intent of replacing septic systems

By JOHN TANACREDI Established in 2004 and incorporated in 2013 with the research field station for Molloy Colleges’ BS degree program in Earth and Environmental Sciences, CERCOM is the only captive breeding laboratory for Horseshoe Crabs in the United States. The only other breeding program linked to a biological academic program is in City University of Hong Kong. There are only four species of Horseshoe Crabs on Earth and their paleo history extends back 455 million years before the present, surviving five mass extinction (global) events where the majority of organisms were lost including the dinosaurs. If their fascinating paleo-survivability weren’t enough, Horseshoe Crabs are a sentinel species in conservation biology and a seminal species in their contributions to human health.

For the North American Horseshoe Crab, also known as the Atlantic horseshoe crab (scientific name Limulus polyphemus), each year females come ashore from Maine to the Yucatan to deposit between 80,000 and 100,000 eggs in the coastal wetlands, fertilized by males, and provide a cornucopia of protein for millions of migrating birds. This mix of adult, eggs, and juvenile horseshoe crabs provide for a diversity of consumers like birds (red knots), reptiles (marine turtles), finfish (winter flounder) and are all mixed in tidal cycles out to the nearshore ocean, where they all are part of the feeding frenzy of a revitalization of marine mammals such as the humpbacked whale which can be observed breaching to feed on the bumper crop of menhaden along the Atlantic Coast.

From the most practical importance of horseshoe crabs to us all, their blood contains the critical component in the production of Limulus Amebocyte Lysate (LAL), a $350 million pharmaceutical industry providing this endotoxin detector to all hospitals for detecting the possibility of gram-negative bacteria on surgical instruments or as contaminants of prescription drugs. NASA used LAL to detect contamination from microbes in the clean room for the now-completed space shuttle program

and for space station development.

Each summer since 2004, CERCOM at Molloy College has monitored over 115 horseshoe crab sites from the tip of Brooklyn to the tip of Montauk on Long Island. Each of these sites originally were identified as horseshoe crab breeding sites. Each site was inventoried for horseshoe crab breeding (eggs deposited or in amplexus breeding behavior) conditions.

Over this 15-plus years of monitoring, the original population of crabs observed has declined about 1% per year; however unfortunately in that same 15-year period slightly over 8% of the original breeding sights no longer exhibit horseshoe crabs or nesting activities. Several other issues impact on horseshoe crab protection. They are used for bait for conch and eel fisheries at a harvest level in New York State of 135,000 animals per season. These are lost totally to the horseshoe crabs breeding class as they are cut-up and stored for eel pots.

The horseshoe crab has become an “exotic food” resource where in Malaysia, Indonesia, and other parts of Asia during the breeding season, 10,000 adult animals are harvested, bled out for TAL production purposes [TAL and LAL have similar functions] and then all flesh removed to be sold at fisheries markets. At that rate they should be close to, if not extinct by the year 2030.

Today all the horseshoe crab species are being proposed for listing on the IUCN’s Red List as critically “vulnerable”. Much more work is required however Horseshoe Crab scientists from around the world will be meeting in China in June 2019 to gather more information and strategies to protect these amazing animals. I have also prepared a petition to present to UNESCO to declare horseshoe crabs the first world Heritage Species under its World Heritage Program. The petition can be read at https://www.thepetitionsite.com/875/761/056/ petition-unesco-support-in-creating-a-global-sanctuary-for-the-horseshoe-crab/?taf_ id=44151922&cid=fb_na#bbfb=855624502 If you have a passion to protect these ancient marinas come visit CERCOM (class visits can be arranged) or contact me to chat a bit. #

with “innovative/advanced onsite wastewater treatment systems.” In other words, the LIRPC has embraced the consensus view that the real enemy is our septic tank system, and not larger forces at work on Long Island. **The main impacts on our ecosystem on Long Island is overdevelopment, not the septic systems that the roughly 400,000 households in Suffolk County use. If we are not going to curb development, and we don’t intend to install a proper water sewerage treatment system the way the rest of the metropolitan region has, then implementing a proper incentive for Suffolk’s homeowners rather than a “lottery” system is the way to go.

Only the independent homeowner can make

the difference. Their path to environmental protection is to have an economic incentive, rather than misinforming them into paying the freight for septic system “upgrades”. Their buy-in for environmental protection and restoration must not be burdensome. An economic relief from government by incentivizing self-maintenance of septic systems, will be far better for LI and all its residents in the long run. # Dr. John Tanacredi is Professor of Earth and Environmental Studies in the Department of Biology, Chemistry and Environmental Studies and serves as the Executive Director of the Center for Environmental Research and Coastal Oceans Monitoring (CERCOM) at Molloy College.

22

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

NOV/DEC 2018

Barnard College Celebrates Grand Opening of The Milstein Center

Barnard College held the official grand opening for The Cheryl and Philip Milstein Center for Teaching and Learning recently. The new building, which opened in early September, serves as the hub of academic and intellectual life at Barnard and reinforces the institution’s commitment to sustainability and climate action.

The 128,000-square-foot building, designed by award-winning architecture firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP (SOM), is a distinctive place that facilitates dialogue and collaboration between students and faculty. It includes a new kind of library, one that brings together current technologies and learning spaces in flexible, interactive settings. Furthermore, it is a dynamic academic campus hub, linking departments and disciplines both physically and philosophically.

“The opening of The Milstein Center marks an important milestone for Barnard,” said Sian Leah Beilock, President of Barnard College.

“Its completion supports the creation of new pathways for learning that build on our foundation of academic excellence and inquiry across disciplines. We are tremendously thankful for the Milsteins’ support of this beautiful building, and for SOM’s innovative design that will inspire students, faculty, staff, alumnae, and friends of the College for years to come.”

The Center is named in honor of Cheryl Glicker Milstein ’82 P’14, the newly-elected chair of Barnard’s Board of Trustees, and her husband Philip Milstein CC’71 P’14, who donated $25 million for the project.

The Milsteins have long been supporters of Barnard; Cheryl was elected to the board in 1999, serving on several prominent committees, and has chaired or co-chaired seven of the last eighteen Barnard galas, the College’s most significant annual fundraiser for scholarships.

The Milsteins were also major donors to the construction of The Diana Center, which was completed in 2010.

“We are so pleased to share in this moment with the Barnard community,” said Cheryl Milstein. “We believe that every element of the new building will enhance the learning experience of each student who arrives on Barnard’s campus, and provide our stellar faculty with innovative tools and spaces they need to teach and collaborate with the next generation of women leaders.

About the Building The $137 million building is expected to achieve a LEED Silver rating, featuring approximately 12,000 square feet of green roofs and outdoor terraces that reduce the heat island effect and provide inviting spaces for study, contemplation, and connection to nature within the urban campus. The facade is made of patinated zinc shingles that harmonize with the surrounding brick, stone, and concrete buildings. The building’s design features support

Cheryl Milstein ’82, P’14, chair of Barnard’s Board of Trustees and Philip Milstein CC’71 P’14

Barnard’s commitment to climate action, both through its curriculum and the College community’s sustainability initiatives.

“SOM’s design for The Milstein Center is the result of a close collaboration with Barnard College,” said Roger Duffy, SOM Senior Consulting Design Partner. “Through countless conversations with faculty and students, we’ve been able to envision a building that not only serves Barnard’s needs today but positions this important New York City institution at the forefront of new technologies and approaches to learning. The building is centrally located, overlooking the Barnard Lawn and the broader Columbia University campus, and is oriented to bring sunlight and additional vibrancy to one of the College’s central gathering places.”

SOM designed The Milstein Center in response to its prominent location overlooking Barnard’s lawn, its signature outdoor space.

A five-story base rises in a series of terraces, maximizing the amount of sunlight that reaches campus throughout the day. On the west side of the building, a narrow, eleven-story tower physically connects to science classrooms and labs in the neighboring Altschul Hall.

Large windows and careful lighting design add to picturesque indoor spaces while contributing to energy savings. A double height ceiling and an exposed wood staircase lend drama to the 40,000-square-foot library, which features a core collection of books, journals, zines, and special collections, and enhanced storage for the Barnard archives. The building will also host various academic departments including economics, political science, and urban studies, in addition to several of Barnard’s internationally-acclaimed programs including the Athena Center for Leadership Studies and the Barnard Center for Research on Women (BCRW).

Several educational centers are housed inside The Milstein Center: The Vagelos Computational Science Center, affirming Barnard’s commitment to preparing women for successes in STEM fields; The Center for Engaged Pedagogy, to offer new methodologies in teaching innovation and student learning; The Digital Humanities Center, to enhance digital literacy and leverage advances in humanistic inquiry with cutting-edge technology; The Design Center, a maker space that will encourage thinking across disciplines; The Empirical Reasoning Center, to support students as they engage with data in meaningful, responsible ways; The Elsie K. Sloate Media Center, featuring labs where students will build valuable knowledge and confidence in emerging skills and technologies used by 21st-century digital producers and creators; and The Movement Lab, for hands-on, innovative movement research, exploration and production, and to promote the exchange of ideas and cross-fertilization of movement with other disciplines.#

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

23

Artificial Intelligence: The Importance of R esponsible D igital C itizenship

DepositPhotos/the_lightwriter

By JASON OHLER, PhD

Big Idea: All of our AI apps and intelligent machines will need ethical programming.

Whose ethics shall we use?

Imagine that you are driving down the highway in the family SUV, your two children and the dog in the back seat. Suddenly, a deer jumps out in front of your car. You can: 1) jump the curb and hope you don’t hurt everyone in the car as well as two people on the sidewalk who are out walking their dog; 2) hit the deer, knowing that doing so would probably injure or maybe even kill you and your passengers, and certainly annihilate the deer, or 3) cross into oncoming traffic and take a chance you can outmaneuver all the cars headed straight for you. A decision needs to be made in a split second.

And, oh yes, you aren’t driving. You are in an autonomous, self-driving SUV. Your car will need to decide. Even if your car has some kind of override that allows you take control of the vehicle, it is all happening too fast. You have no choice but to let your car make the decision and hope for the best.

This is not a contrived situation. Tech ethicists are already trying to unravel quandaries like this as AI permeates daily living. And the future is just getting started.

The Trolley Problem, updated with AI

This dilemma is not unlike the one described in the Trolley Problem, a foundational thought experiment in most college ethics classes that has been debated by a number of moral philosophers. In Dr. Judith Jarvis Thompson’s version, a trolley with failed brakes is hurtling down a hill toward five workmen who are repairing the tracks. There is the very real possibility that the workmen will not see the train in time to move. However, you can throw a switch and send the trolley on to another track where it will kill only one person. Which option is more ethically sound? Or, in more modern terms, how would we program an AI machine — like a self-driving car — to respond?

In the SUV and deer dilemma, your car is being tasked with making the same kind of ethical decision that a human would need to make. So, if you had a few seconds, how might you think this through? Is it simple math?

Option 1 risks hurting five people and two dogs. Option 2 guarantees some kind of damage, probably to you and your passengers, and most definitely to the deer, and perhaps risks a pileup as traffic behind you swerves to avoid the accident. Option 3 is filled with unknowns, putting everyone in your car at risk, as well as anyone you might collide with in the oncoming lane. The number of people who might be hurt is potentially quite high but impossible to

calculate.

As an aside, do you value the life of your own dog in the back seat more than the dog on the sidewalk that you don’t know? Or how about the unknown dog vs. the deer; are they of equal value to you? Your car may need to know how you would answer those questions in order to calculate its response.

We are making moral machines Whenever artificial intelligence crosses the line from functional decision-making into weighing the fate of human beings, it joins the rest of society in the gray area of moral responsibility. More importantly, in a world of deep machine learning, AI entities will develop as moral beings by learning from their experience — just as we do. Whatever the car’s AI programming decides to do will feed its evolving moral sensibilities. We better make sure that our initial SUV programming reflects what’s best in us.

Cars are just the beginning. Our robots and self-aware homes, even the bots we use to answer our email, will also be faced with similar moral dilemmas. Most of our new tech will be AI infused in some way. We will shop for the smartest AI we can afford. The smarter it becomes, the more we will depend on programmers to craft AI that extends us, in McLuhanistic terms, in ways that reflect who

we are as moral human beings. Given we might all handle the deer and SUV situation differently, what kind of programmer will we turn to?

In a recent edition of Education Update, I made the case for needing Character Education Version 2.0 to help our students, as well as ourselves, make the complex ethical decisions required in living a digital lifestyle. We need to hurry because a need for Character Education Version 3.0 is already here: training our AI creations to be able to think ethically in ways that reflect our better selves. When shopping for AI that supplements and in many ways co-authors our lives, we will consider not only how smart it is but also how it frames its ethical decisions.

After all, soon our robots will become our fellow digital citizens. We will want to make sure they are the kind of neighbors we want living in our communities. # Jason Ohler is a professor emeritus of educational technology and virtual learning, as well as a distinguished President’s Professor, University of Alaska. When he is not playing with his many grandchildren, he is a professor in Fielding Graduate University’s Media Psychology PhD program. At 65 he continues to write, conduct research, oversee student PhD activities, and deliver keynotes internationally about the future of humans and technology trying to make peace with each other.

24

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

By LYDIA LIEBMAN

Recently, The Rockefeller University presented the highly prestigious Pearl Meister Greengard Prize to Jennifer Doudna, Ph.D. Dr. Doudna is the Li Ka Shing Chancellors Chair in Biomedical and Health Sciences, a professor of chemistry and molecular & cell biology at the University of California, Berkley and an investigator at Howard Hughes Medical Institute. She is best known for her work on the CRISPR gene-editing technology that has sparked a scientific revolution.

The event began with a warm welcome delivered by Richard P. Lifton, M.D., Ph.D., President and Carson Family Professor at The Rockefeller University. After introducing a short video about the prize, he went on to introduce the evening’s presenter, philanthropist and arts patron Agnes Gund. Known as “Art’s Grande Dame,” Agnes Gund is President Emerita, Museum of Modern Art, Founder and Chair of Studio in a School, Founding Donor.

In her remarks, Gund praised The Rockefeller University for the special role it plays in public life. She praised the programs for parents, the institute for high schoolers, the fellowships for college students, the art offerings and lectures, as well as the programs for women scientists.

“There is so much happening here to show how seriously The Rockefeller University believes that science must be perceived as a public good by the public,” she said. She went on to discuss the importance of the prize and share some of her own personal interests and causes. She then introduced Dr. Doudna and gave an overview of her work.

Dr. Lipton then came to the podium to present the award to Dr. Doudna. He read excerpts from the citation: You are being honored for your incredible discoveries about RNA structure and function, which have provided insight into the mechanisms of catalytic RNAs, revealed general principals that guide the folding of numerous physiologically important RNA molecules, unveiled critical aspects of RNA protein interactions, and have contributed mightily to the development of gene editing using CRISPR. Following the formal presentation, Dr. Doudna joined Dr. Lifton for a short conversation. They discussed some of the exciting things going on her lab. She said, “We’re continuing to understand and investigate the fundamental biology of these CRISPR adaptive immune systems… the other thing we’re doing increasingly is trying to figure out how we can use this gene editing technology to effect human health in positive ways.” They

Keegan Houser/The Rockefeller University

Dr. Jennifer Doudna Receives Pearl Meister Greengard Prize at The Rockefeller University

Dr. Jennifer Doudna

also spoke about the importance of keeping scientists involved in policy discussions. She spoke about the prevalent “unfortunate mistrust” in science and implored her fellow scientists to “get out of the lab” and talk about their research. She also encouraged young scientists to seek out mentors.

The Pearl Meister Greengard Prize is an international award that recognizes outstanding women in biomedical research. The prestigious award was established by Dr. Paul Greengard, the Vincent Astor Professor, and his wife, the sculptor Ursula von Rydingsvard.

Dr. Greengard donated his entire monetary share of the 2000 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine to Rockefeller University to establish the annual prize in honor of the accomplishments of women scientists. The prize was named in memory of Dr. Greengard’s mother, who died giving birth to him. Past recipients of the award, as well as the $100,000 honorarium, include Dr. Mary Lyon, Dr. Philippa Marrack, Dr. Brenda Milner and Nobel laureates Dr. Elizabeth Blackburn and Dr. Carol Greider, among others. Joan Didion, Sandra Day O’Connor, Andrea Mitchell, Rachel Maddow and former president of Ireland Mary Robinson have all been past presenters. Dr. Doudna is the 19th recipient of the award over 15 years. #

■

NOV/DEC 2018

Mercy College Announces Brian L. Johnson, New Vice President of the M ercy C ollege Manhattan Campus

Mercy College has appointed Brian L. Johnson, Ph.D. as Vice President of the Mercy College Manhattan Campus. He will oversee the College’s Herald Square campus.

With more than 18 years of experience in higher education, Johnson was selected by Mercy College following a comprehensive search that produced a highly qualified pool of applicants.

In making the announcement, President Hall said, “I am excited that Dr. Johnson will join the Mercy College senior team. His dedication, experience, and outcomes-oriented approach are exactly what Mercy needs as we enhance the Mercy Manhattan experience for our students.”

“I was impressed by Mercy College’s spirit and deep commitment of providing higher education to a diverse, driven student population,” said Johnson. “I am looking forward to using my student-centric leadership, knowledge, and expertise in this position and to capitalize on the opportunity Mercy Manhattan provides at its prime location in the heart of midtown.”

Dr. Johnson, who served as president of Tuskegee University, was instrumental in achieving academic excellence, establishing a strategic enrollment plan, which resulted in the university’s highest enrollment in the 2016– 2017 fiscal year, and implementing academic innovation through enhanced infrastructure and technology including the introduction of a new online degree. Johnson increased fundraising initiatives which saw alumni giving increase from 9% to 10.45% and was instrumental in growing the visibility of the University through media outreach and world renowned commencement speakers such as First Lady Michelle Obama and world-renowned producer, director and actor Tyler Perry.

Johnson earned an undergraduate degree from Johnson C. Smith University, a master’s degree in English from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and a Ph.D. in American literature from the University of South Carolina

in 2003. He also serves as a member of the board of trustees for The Trinity Forum and served on the (UNCF) United Negro College Fund Institutional Board of Directors. Dr. Johnson also served as a 2012–2013 A.C.E. Fellow at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis within the IU Lilly Family School of Philanthropy. This partnership led to a major convening of foundation and corporate partners in 2016 held at the NCAA headquarters in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Prior to Tuskegee University, Johnson served as the Vice President of Strategic Planning and Institutional Effectiveness and Assistant Provost for Academic Affairs/Chief Diversity Officer at Austin Peay State University. While at Austin Peay, Johnson was part of the team that increased performance-based funding by 12.9% based upon retention and graduation rates and increased enrollment from 5,000 to 10,000 students through a combination of new academic programming.

The Manhattan Campus of Mercy College, located in the heart of New York City in Herald Square, is a convenient location for those who live or work in New York City. Mercy College has plans to enhance programming, increase enrollment, and provide valuable resources for community partnerships. # Mercy College is the dynamic, diverse New York City area college whose students are on a personal mission: to get the most out of life by getting the most out of their education. Founded in 1950, Mercy is a coeducational and nonsectarian college that offers more than 90 undergraduate and graduate degree and certificate programs within five schools: Business, Education, Health and Natural Sciences, Liberal Arts and Social and Behavioral Sciences.

With campuses in Dobbs Ferry, Bronx, Manhattan and Yorktown Heights, the vibrancy of the College culture is sustained by a diverse student body from around the region.

www. EducationUpdate.com LIKE our Facebook page & follow our posts on the latest news at:

/EducationUpdate

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

25

MOVIE REVIEW

By DR. LEONARD QUART

Daniel Patrick Moynihan was a unique figure in contemporary American politics. His resume was probably more imposing than any US Senator within my lifetime. Among his many accomplishments: US Ambassador to India, UN Representative, US Senator representing NYS, professor at Harvard, and author of significant books (e.g., Beyond the Melting Pot).

The recent documentary Moynihan directed

by Joe Dorman and played at the Film Forum provided an extremely sympathetic biographical portrait of this wide-ranging public intellectual and liberal politician, emphasizing the power of his ideas rather than exploring his familial life or constructing a vivid personal portrait.

We learned that Moynihan spent most of his formative years in various New York neighborhoods. Sometimes he had to endure economically hard times (he shined shoes as a boy), and Moynihan also worked for a short period in his mother’s bar in Hells Kitchen. But he attended Tufts during WWII and received his BA and MA there, and ultimately his Ph.D. from Tufts Fletcher School of Diplomacy. And though Moynihan may have nurtured an identity that he was at home with guys who drank beer and worked on the docks, his speeches sounded Churchillian not folksy and he often dressed in Seville Row suits. He may have been deeply committed to helping the poor and the working class, but his personal style was patrician.

Still, this is a film about Moynihan the erudite, witty, and eloquent (he had a gift for the striking phrase) man of ideas who could be prescient about the decline of the Soviet Union, and his last political causes were such issues a strengthening Social Security and attacking government secrecy. His prime commitment was trying to figure out how to go beyond the groundbreaking civil rights legislation passed under Johnson that ended much of the brunt of legal racism, and how to strengthen the black family, which he saw as reaching a point of disintegration. He described, through pages of worrying charts and graphs, the emergence of a “tangle of pathology,” including delinquency, joblessness, school failure, crime, and fatherlessness that were an integral part of underclass behavior.

This thesis was published during the Johnson years as The Moynihan Report (1965) and it instantly aroused controversy.

Some white liberal academics and black intellectuals viewed it as blaming the victim and attacked Moynihan’s perspective. Some even saw Moynihan as promoting racist views.

Moynihan felt blindsided by what he saw as underserved attacks that willfully misun-

Library of Congress

Daniel Patrick Moynihan: A Unique Political Figure

derstood the complexity of an analysis that comprehended that the difficulties of the black family couldn’t be reduced to economics. He asserted that families were entwined in a variety of systems — familial, cultural, and economic — that shaped their existence. Moynihan was of course not advocating that the family should reconstruct itself in a political vacuum, but that the federal government must adopt policies, especially in education and employment, “designed to have the effect, directly or indirectly, of enhancing the stability and resources of the Negro American family.”

Moynihan always went his own way politically — he had a contrarian streak — so in 1969, a conservative president, Nixon, appointed him his urban affairs adviser. Moynihan then promoted the idea of a Family Assistance Plan over the opposition of many of the President’s most conservative advisers. The Plan would deal with poverty by making all families with chil-

dren eligible for a minimum stipend, and no longer would the absence of a father be a precondition for welfare. Essentially it was a guaranteed income for the unemployed and income supplements to the working poor. However, the plan died in the Senate, under both Republican and Democratic opposition. Liberal Democrats opposed it because the income was set too low, while Republicans viewed it as too generous.

Moynihan was not only a man of ideas, but also an effective Senator (1977–2001). In his first term he teamed with Jacob K. Javits to pass legislation guaranteeing $2 billion worth of New York City obligations at a time when the city faced bankruptcy. He also successfully pushed to shift highway financing toward mass transit — and get New York $5 billion in retroactive reimbursement for building the New York State Thruway before the federal government began the Interstate Highway System, though he was not someone who would be

primarily remembered for the legislation that was passed under his name.

Moynihan was basically a New Deal liberal, whose politics defied categorization. He was opposed to the Vietnam War, but highly critical of the protestors. In fact, he only saw danger in the black and white radicalism of the ‘60s.

He was also antipathetic to the Clintons’ health care legislation, since he saw no crisis in that area. Still, his range of interests was wide, including creating public architecture symbolizing the “dignity, enterprise, vigor, and stability” of American government. I didn’t always agree with Moynihan’s politics, but if every Senator had even a portion of his panache, integrity, intellect, and profound commitment to the poor, the current state of our politics wouldn’t be mired in the foul smelling muck we find it in. # Dr. Leonard Quart is professor emeritus at the College of Staten Island.

26

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

American Museum of Natural History: Richard Gilder Graduate School Confers Degrees

continued from page 20

AMNH

AMNH

Richard Gilder Graduate School Dean John Flynn (pictured) and Provost of Science Michael Novacek conferred the Ph.D. degrees

Motivating Mathematics

Marine biologist Dr. Jane Lubchenco was honored with the degree Doctor of Science honoris causa AMNH

The 2018 commencement took place under the iconic 21,000-pound fiberglass blue whale model in the Milstein Hall of Ocean Life

Recently, the American Museum of Natural History’s Richard Gilder Graduate School held its sixth commencement to confer Ph.D. degrees in Comparative Biology and Master of Arts degrees in Teaching (MAT) under the iconic blue whale in the Milstein Hall of Ocean Life. This year, the program graduated 16 new science teachers working in high-needs New York schools and six Ph.D. graduates in Comparative Biology.

The school houses two graduate programs: The doctoral program in Comparative Biology and the Master of Arts in Teaching. This year, the school celebrated its ten-year anniversary since the first cohort of students enrolled at the first museum in the Western Hemisphere to confer degrees. To date, the Richard Gilder Graduate School has produced 78 MAT graduates who are teaching in high-needs New York state schools and 29 Ph.D. graduates, most of whom work in science, academic, educational, and museum fields, including at the National Science Foundation, the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Royal Ontario Museum, and the University of Edinburgh.

The Richard Gilder Graduate School draws on the Museum’s world-renowned collections, distinguished faculty, and tradition of globespanning expeditions for its innovative Ph.D. program in comparative biology, which covers the origins, history, and range of life on Earth.

Under the leadership of Michael J. Novecek,

the Museum’s provost of science, and Dean John J. Flynn, the Museum’s graduate school community also includes postdoctoral scholars, undergraduate summer researchers, and graduate students in longstanding collaborative Ph.D. programs with partner universities that include the City University of New York, Columbia University, Cornell University, New York University and Stony Brook University.

The MAT program addresses a critical shortage of qualified science teachers in New York State, particularly in high-needs schools with diverse populations, by providing a specialization in Earth Science for middle-school and high-school teachers.

President Ellen Futter, former president of Barnard College, gave an impassioned speech on the need to prepare future science advocates.

“The Richard Gilder Graduate School trains young scientists and new science teachers within the context of natural history to be the voices and forces for science and education that our world so urgently needs.

Futter went on to eloquently say that “Natural history museums like ours document, protect, educate about and celebrate the natural world and the cultures of humanity.” Our graduates go forth in a time that needs them so urgentlya time when some of society’s loudest voices devalue science and reason, denigrate diversity and even truth.” #

motivate the subject so that the learners will be eager to learn this required subject, rather than to feel obligated to learn it as part of this school experience. In recent years, this neglect has even gotten more obvious, since the evaluation of teacher performance has become paramount in most countries. School performance is typically measured by how well students perform in the key subjects, such as mathematics.

With the increase of technology in the instructional program, regular testing of students has become more prevalent and also more statistically ripe for comparison purposes. All too often, teachers are observed to be “teaching to the test” as they feel that their evaluation and teaching performance will be based on the test results of their students. All of this mitigates against deviating from the tested materials to other aspects of mathematics that are not part of the curriculum. At the same time, it is clear that motivated students are more receptive learners. It is unfortunate that throughout most teacher training programs, potential teachers are not exposed to many extracurricular topics that can be used to interest students. Some of these unusual topics are often surprising or counterintuitive. Not only are they are in and of themselves attractive, but they can also be useful for better understanding everyday life experiences. Presentation of these topics is then complicated by teachers not wanting to deviate from the prescribed curriculum for fear of using time that could otherwise be more directed at the required curriculum. So, what are some of these unusual topics? Let us consider a few of these now; and be aware that parents as well as teachers can use them productively to make mathematics come alive.

As we explore some of these examples, take note how their counterintuitive nature in and of itself is motivating since it demonstrates how learning mathematics helps us navigate through our lives.

We begin with a question that most have never thought to ask themselves. When we walk over manhole covers in the street, we take for granted that they are always circular.

The question is, why are they always circular in shape? Well, the reason is very simple: As you can see in figure 1, the circular shape cover can never fall into the hole, as would be the case with a square shape cover.

Here is where the topic gets enlarged and should be of even greater interest to students. It is then natural to ask if there is any other shape that can be used to cover a manhole and that will also not be able to fall into the hole? The answer was provided by the German engineer Franz Reuleaux (1829 – 1905), who developed a rather odd-looking shape that is now called a Reuleaux triangle, which we show in figure 2.

This is created by beginning with an equilateral triangle and drawing a circular arc on each side with the circle’s center at the opposite vertex.

One might wonder how Franz Reuleaux ever thought of this triangle. It turns out that he was in search of a button that was not round, but still could fit through a button hole equally well

■

NOV/DEC 2018

from any orientation. His “triangle” solved the problem, as seen in figure 3.

Figure 4 shows one such manhole cover in the shape of a Reuleaux triangle.

This becomes particularly significant when fire hydrants are designed so that only special tools can turn them on. Often, a pentagonal valve screw is used since a common wrench – which requires two parallel sides – cannot be used, as would be the case with a hexagonal or a square valve screw, each of which has a pair of parallel opposite sides.

A Reuleaux triangle type valve screw, which has the same properties as a circle, but can only be turned with a wrench of exactly the same shape. One such example of a fire hydrant is shown in figure 5.

An ambitious parent or a teacher who would like to tie this discussion into the curriculum, might want to pursue the connection between the Reuleaux triangle and the circle. A curious property of the Reuleaux triangle is that the ratio of its perimeter to its breadth, which is ((1/2 • 2πr) / r) = π, is the same as that ratio for a circle, (2πr/2r) = π.

The comparison of the areas of these two shapes is quite another thing, and could be useful when deciding what shape to make a manhole cover. The area of the Reuleaux triangle can be obtained by adding the three circle sectors that overlap the equilateral triangle and then deducting the pieces that overlap, which is twice the area of the equilateral triangle.The total area of the three overlapping circle sectors, where each is 1/6 of the area of the circle, is equal to 3 (1/6)(πr2). From this we need to subtract twice the area of the equilateral triangle, which is (r2 √3) / 4. Therefore, the area of the Reuleaux triangle is equal to 3(1/6)(πr2)-2((r2 √3)/4)=((r2/2)(π - √3)) ≈ r2 ((3.1416 – 1.732)/2) = 0.7048 • r2, while the area of a circle with diameter of length r is equal to (π(r/2)2) = (πr2)/4 = 0.7854 • r2.

Therefore, the area of the Reuleaux triangle is less than the area of the circle, which we can also see rather clearly in figure 6. This is consistent with our understanding of regular polygons, where the circle has the largest area for a given diameter.

Therefore, from a practical standpoint, to design a manhole cover of a given breadth, and one that would not be able to fall into the hole, the Reuleaux triangle shape would be the economic choice as it would require less metal construct. Here is an interesting application of some genuine mathematics applied to a piece of our environment that we seem to take for granted.

Percentage problems have long been a nemesis for many people, and unfortunately tediously taught in the schools. Problems get particularly unpleasant when multiple percentages need to be calculated for the same base.

Suppose a store is offering a 20% discount on top of an already discounted price of 10%.

Intuitively, many people will assume that is the equivalent of a 30% discount. This, of course, is not true!

THIS ARTICLE CONTINUES ONLINE AT www.EducationUpdate.com

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

Dr. Brenda Greene Delivers Son’s Remarks at N ew Y ork H istorical Society Event

By LYDIA LIEBMAN

the Constitution made with This fall, The New York slavery, or as it was often Historical Society hosted a euphemistically called, “the special preview for its new peculiar institution.” The exhibit “Black Citizenship in Fugitive Slave Clause, which the Age of Jim Crow”. This promised that escaped slaves is the inaugural exhibition could be recaptured. The confor the New York Historical tinuation of the trans-Atlantic Society’s newest initiative, slave trade for another 20 which is dedicated to telling years after ratification of the Dr. Brenda Greene the story of struggle for freeConstitution. The so-called dom, civil rights, and equality in America. The three-fifths compromise, which unnaturally exhibition explores the struggle for full citizen- increased the basis for political representation ship and racial equality that unfolded in the 50 in southern states. That compromise affected years after the Civil War. not only the composition of the House of The keynote speaker was Dr. Brenda Greene, Representatives but also the composition of who delivered the remarks written by her the Electoral College. That in turn affected the son, Jamal Greene. Dr. Brenda Greene is the presidency. With just two exceptions, every one Founder and Executive Director of the Center of the fifteen U.S. presidents from the founding for Black Literature, Director of National of the nation until Lincoln was either a slaveoBlack Writer’s Conference and Chair of the wner or was openly sympathetic to the interests English Department at Medgar Evers College. of slaveholders. The two exceptions were John In addition to her myriad accomplishments, Adams, who served just one term, and John she is the mother of two famous men: the Quincy Adams, who also served only one term rapper and activist Talib Kweli and Jamal and who did not actually receive the most elecGreene, Dwight Professor of Law at Columbia toral votes in the election he won.

University. Jamal Greene was unable to deliver The Civil War was of course fought over his keynote remarks in person because he was the maintenance and expansion of slavery. in Washington D.C. assisting Senator Kamala Full stop. And the constitutional changes that Harris during the high profile Brett Kavanaugh emerged from the Civil War are what we honor Senate hearings. when we celebrate this year the 150th anniverDr. Greene delivered some words of her sary of the Fourteenth Amendment, the jewel of own before presenting those of her sons. “This the Reconstruction Amendments. exhibit is extremely important in this time when The constitution, he explained, is grounded the voting rights of people of color are under in the promise of the Fourteenth Amendment attack and being eroded … when the rights of and the other Reconstruction amendments. He immigrants are being violated, when the rights went on to tell an anecdote about a time he of those who were formerly incarcerated are visited Cadiz, Ohio, where John Bingham, eroded, and the rights of naturalized citizens are primary author of the Fourteenth Amendment, being questions,” she said. She also praised the grew up. “But when you talk to the folks at the New York Historical Society for raising aware- tiny historical society office a block from the ness of social justice and civil rights issues Cadiz courthouse about the statue, they groan through their exhibits over the years. that tourists always think it’s a statue of Clark She then went on to delivery her son’s Gable. You see, “The King of Hollywood” remarks. Mr. Greene’s thoughtful words cov- was born and grew up in Cadiz. Gable is the ered a lot of ground. He praised his mother, one whose birthplace tourists come to Cadiz who he called his “bridge” to the exhibit. to see,” he said. The reason many people do He went on to discuss his late grandmoth- not remember Bingham is because of the Lost er, Beverly Moorehead, who recently passed Cause narrative. This narrative, in a sense, away. “I mention my grandmother because rewrites history by painting the Confederate this exhibit is about memory. It is about what cause as a heroic one against great odds despite we remember, and how we remember and who its defeat. The movement, Jamal said, was we remember.” His remarks went on to discuss successful in shaping and distorting collective the constitution and how the story of the U.S. memory of the Reconstruction. In his words, Constitution is “a deeply racialized story” due this exhibit recovers the struggle and recaptures to the many explicit bargains the Constitution the nobility of a people too easily forgotten. made with slavery. His remarks read: The exhibition runs through March, 2019 and Many of you are aware of the explicit bargains is not to be missed. #

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

27

Medicare Rights Center Honors Dr. Oliver Fein

By OLIVER FEIN, MD To be honored by the Medicare Rights Center, an organization that provides “direct services to patients (consumers) and public policy initiatives” directed at making “Medicare and the entire health care system better for all Americans” is a special honor.

In a focused way, it is what I have tried to do through caring for a diverse group of patients from all social classes and advocating for an expanded and improved Medicare for All. The Medicare Rights Center has been an important compliment to my activities. For the last 20 years, each year I have organized and taught a course for internal medicine residents called “Perspectives on the Changing Health Care System” (POCHS) in which I describe the complexity of our multi-payer, for-profit health insurance system. In the course of their clinical practices, residents will have patients who will ask: “Should I enroll in the original Medicare program or a Medicare Advantage Plan?” I tell the residents, you do not have the expertise to answer that question…just give your patients the number of the Medicare Rights Center. (Take out your cell phones and enter it.) Be sure that your patients know that they can even get personal counselling at Medicare Rights. This is probably the most helpful concrete information they get out of my course.

In addition, I suggest to my colleagues who are Medicare for All advocates that they should consult the Medicare Rights Center’s website.

Dr. Betsy Rosenthal, a retired dermatologist at Albert Einstein College of Medicine decided to do just that — and became a volunteer counselor for the Medicare Rights Center once a week. She has had ten letters to the editor published in the New York Times and is an articulate speaker on single payer Medicare for All for Physicians for a National Health Program.

Clearly, single-payer National Health Insurance reform has been my passion for many years. When I was a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellow in the Office of Senate Majority leader George Mitchell in 1994 in the midst of the Clinton health reform effort, I remember seeing Bruce Vladeck at all the Finance Committee hearings in his role as Administrator for the Health Care Financing Administration of HHS. However, there was no mention of single payer. Then in 2009, at the White House Health Care Summit, when I was President of Physicians for a National Health Program, I spoke with President Obama about improved Medicare for All, but he felt we were not ready for such a reform. However when the New York Times features Medicare for All on the front page of the Sunday Review,

Dr. Oliver Fein

as they did [recently], the conversation has changed. This year, the New York Health Act passed the New York State Assembly 2-to1 on June 1 and had 31 co-sponsors in the Senate. Medicare for All is a topic of much wider political dialogue.

In closing, I would like to recognize some of the colleagues who have made it possible for me to receive this award. Dr. Madelon Finkel, Director of the Office of Global Health Education, which provides Weill Cornell students international rotations in developing and developed countries, where students can experience universal coverage systems; Drs. Susana Morales and Elizabeth Wilson-Anstey from Weill Cornell’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion, who have championed programs for under-represented minorities at Weill Cornell; Dr. Monika Safford, Chief of the Division of General Internal Medicine, founder and Co-Director of Cornell’s Center for Health Equity; Dr. Martin Shapiro, health services researcher in the Division of General Medicine; as well as Emilie George and Christopher Gamboa, medical students who started the Students for a National Health Program chapter at Weill Cornell. Recently, Emilie was the primary organizer of a student conference on Advocacy in Medicine held at the NY Academy of Medicine that was attended by over 200 students from all eight medical schools in the NY metropolitan area.

Thank you all for being here with me and making it possible for me to receive this award.

We are all grateful for the recognition by the Medicare Rights Center for this honor. #

28

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

NOV/DEC 2018

Is your child Dyslexic or experiencing school failure? If so, we may be the solution.

We strive to help children not only have the skills needed to learn, but want to learn.

TheSterlingSchool We take our commitment seriously Orton Gillingham trained staff Small classes with Individualized attention Art, music, culinary arts and computers for a rich education Unique program that incorporates caring, intelligent, skill building and emotional support by experts in the field

NOW ACCEPTING ADMISSIONS Call 917-909-0942 WWW.STERLINGSCHOOL.COM Ruth Arberman, Director of The Sterling School 134 Atlantic Ave., Brooklyn, New York 11201

NOV/DEC 2018

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

YOUNG JOURNALIST

Boys Will Be Boys

By KATIE DIAMENT I often used to fantasize of growing up when my grandparents did. I would close my eyes, listen to the soundtrack of Dirty Dancing and pretend I was in their shoes. Life seemed so simple.

Life seemed so fun. Life seemed like everything I had ever wanted and more.

Growing up in New York City, I was taught to be independent at a young age.

As much as I loved New York, I felt as though I was missing a huge chunk of my childhood. I wished I could play in the street as my father did. I wished I could have gone over to my neighbor’s for dinner without having to be escorted by my parents or babysitter. I fantasized partaking in movies like Grease and Sixteen Candles and television programs like The Wonder Years, where we would attend school dances and football games. Life seemed so light-hearted. My grandparents would describe their lunch excursions where they would escape from their Weehawken school, hop on the New York City ferry, and explore (much like the plot in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off). This white picket fence life is everything I wanted, however as time progresses the picture of that great quality of life diminishes. The idealistic American Dream society is shattered more and more as I grow older and examine the issues present in society.

With recent allegations against Kavanaugh, my eyes have forever been open. The rape culture within the suburbs of Washington D.C in the 1980s was prevalent. In fact, hearings, with numerous schools within the area, were held in Bethesda, Maryland in the ‘80s to discuss the major issue at hand. The fact that seven schools decided it was enough of a problem to address proves that this issue must have been quite significant. The letter warned parents that their children were in danger and that they “had developed a party culture that included heavy drinking leading to ‘sexual or violent behavior’”. Taking advantage of a woman was a common theme and was illustrated throughout the media. In a Vox article, Constance Grady explains that the typical high school love story, in movies and television, consisted of some form of sexual misconduct. In Sixteen Candles, a drunk girl is tossed around by two different guys at a party. Jake Ryan, known as the ideal dream boy of every teenage girl’s deepest fantasies, had a reputation that lasted for decades.

In the film, he cold-bloodedly hands a drunk and unconscious Caroline over to another guy and says, “Have fun.” This advertising of rape culture made it seem like situations like this were ok, thus proving and raising issues of gender equality during these time periods. We often don’t address or recognize these issues as they are portrayed subconsciously throughout different films from this era. Constance

Grady exclaims, “It’s a high school love story.

It’s been celebrated for 34 years for its sweet, romantic heart. Yet it is entirely willing to feature a lengthy, supposedly hilarious subplot in which a drunk and unconscious girl is passed from one boy to another and then raped.”

During 5th period on the day of the initial hearing, I received a text from my grandmother. “So, do you think he did it?” I asked my grandma what she thought, and who she believed. I often get frustrated with my older family members and their political opinions and beliefs. As I have gotten older and more politically inclined, I can see the differences in opinions between the generations. So, Kavanaugh or Plessey Ford? My grandma told me that she kept changing whom she believed. She exclaimed that when she was little everyone lived by the motto, “boys will be boys,” and that those were the words by which she lived.

I now question my childhood fantasies. Do I really wish that I had partaken in an upbringing like those of the older generations, when boys would just be boys? Should I be grateful for the situational awareness of my peers, especially growing up in New York City? Should I feel safer?

I told my grandma that this is no way to live.

She agreed and said it wasn’t a choice, that this was something that was ingrained in you as you were growing up. I said I did not get it, and questioned how one could not feel inclined to do something about the masculine mentality.

She simply said, “We didn’t question things then.” # Katie Diament is a student at The Beacon School in Manhattan.

■

EDUCATION UPDATE

29

Ambassador Ido Aharoni Receives Leadership Award from K idum

Longtime educator Dr. Charlotte Frank and Ambassador Ido Aharoni

The Consul General of Israel in NY, Ambassador Ido Aharoni, received a leadership award from the American Friends of Kidum recently at a gala at the Jewish Museum. Kidum is a society for the advancement of education in Jerusalem with the goal of empowering youth from disadvantaged communities to attain distinction in their social, educational and leadership endeavors.

Currently, a global distinguished professor at NYU’s School of International Relations, he is the founder of Emerson Rigby, an Israel-based consultancy firm.

“What improves learning is the key question we should ask,” according to Aharoni.

“Learning happens when you allow people to express themselves.”

Students come from more than 120 communities. Each student receives an individualized set of tools for success, and alumni are a source of national pride.

Dr. Charlotte Frank, a long-time advocate and supporter of Kidum, was present and received a great deal of recognition and applause for her work. #

30

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

■

NOV/DEC 2018

“The empower event gives us the chance to showcase our amazing young women. They often share their compelling stories about their families, their struggles, their victories.

I don’t want anyone to ever forget how accomplished and driven our students are.”

Ann Tisch

October 16, 2018

at Cipriani 42nd Street

Founder and President, Student Leadership Network

H O NO R I NG

Tracee Ellis Ross Actress, black-ish

Valerie Radwaner

Deputy Chair Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP T H E

M A N

WE

LOV E

Bruce Mosler

Chairman, Global Brokerage Cushman & Wakefield

“At the end of the day, our annual (Em)Power Breakfast is a celebration of the 9,000 students we impact across our 5 NYC based Young Women’s Leadership Schools and 15 national affiliates. I can’t think of a better way to honor and celebrate their achievements than by having them emcee the event and interview our honorees. They embody all that gives us hope for the future of our city, country and world!”

Jemina R. Bernard

Executive Director, Student Leadership Network

Our Impact 2018 Honorees, Valerie Radwaner and Bruce Mosler, pictured at the event.

Ann & Andrew Tisch, Jemina R. Bernard and students

2,500 students at TYWLS in NYC 95% graduation rate for TYWLS since 2001 6,500 students at our affiliate schools

Our students graduate at nearly four times the rate of their national peers Four-Year college degrees achieved at four times the rate of their national peers

Student Leadership Network

www.studentleadershipnetwork.org

@studentleadnet

@ ? Q L

NOV/DEC 2018

â–

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

â–

EDUCATION UPDATE

31

OBITUARY

Elizabeth Shwal: WAVES '44, Barnard '51

By DR. POLA ROSEN Transcribed By VALENTINA CORDERO

How did you become a WAVE? I went to Barnard on the GI Bill because I was out of the Navy after WWII. My rank was aviation machinist mate, AMM, 2C (second class). I was in for 33 months. I went in as soon as I was 20 - I had to be 20 to get in - and I came out when the president said it was time for the volunteers to get out. WAVES stands for Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service, that's what we did.

Everyone was excited about the war. Hitler was doing terrible things, and so was Mussolini.

And this was an opportunity for young people to get involved. And they paid us $52 a month.

But we weren't sent overseas because they were afraid of putting women on the boats, so the women had their own barracks, separate from the men. We worked with the men, we ate with the men, and we shot with the men, and we went on liberty with the men, but we didn't sleep in the same buildings.

What did you do as part of WAVES? My first assignment was boot camp at Hunter College in the Bronx where they taught us to be Navy people, and we were there for several weeks. And then they sent us to different training schools, I went to the training school in Memphis TN for six weeks to learn how to be what they called a machinist's mate. I remember one job I had to do was take something apart and put it back together again. I never saw one like it again but I did it, that once, and I put it together and I didn't have any pieces left over, so I guess I did it right.

I worked on machinery that made planes fly.

I was in the aviation part. I was in Pensacola for my regular job for 27 months after I was through with the regular training. My main job was to put the oil and gas in and wave them in and out. They just told us where to put it and how to do it, it wasn't very difficult, but somebody had to do it, and if the girls did it then the boys could be free to do something else, in theory.

Then I went to Barnard, met a fellow, liked him and went to meet his family. He took me for a walk in the woods and I fell down and broke an arm and a leg. I was in the hospital for 10 days and had to leave school for a while.

That's why I didn't graduate until '51. Now I'm still here. I was 90 last month.

What were your experiences after Barnard?

Well, it's a little hard to remember, it's all a long time ago. I married for four years, and then finally realized it was a mistake so I went to Reno and got a divorce - that was the way you did it back then. My parents didn't want me to go to college because I had two younger brothers that had to go to Yale, they were very important. As a girl, I didn't count. That's how it was then. When I got out of the service, I was

entitled to a college degree on the GI bill so I finished Barnard and took a Master's degree at NYU. The only Master's degree they would give in one year was elementary education so that meant I should be a school teacher. Well, I did teach school one year {she laughs} and I got fired at the end of it, and that was the end of that.

So then I went to Europe. I stayed in England a year, and then went to Germany because my brother was part of the Foreign Service and he was stationed in Munich.

Career Goals: I taught English in Munich for a while because they had a Berlitz school where I could get paid. After four years I came back, stayed with a girlfriend in Boston and met my

second husband. While there I had secretarial jobs.

When he opened a law office, I became the secretary. And then he died. I had a job at Boston University for a little while, for a professor there, taking his dictation and typing it up.

Then I met and married Zachary, an Egyptian from Harvard. We were married for about 20 years and then he died.

Proudest accomplishments: That's pretty hard to say. I'm an active member of the League of Women Voters and the Women's City Club here in New York for a long time. My mother was with the League of Women Voters while I was still in high school Thoughts on women's education today:

Well I think women have it a lot better today than they did when I was a kid. I've been in banks where women were big bosses and stores where women have been very important, and it wasn't like that when I was younger.

I think it's very good that we have more senators that are women than we had. And we're beginning to have more congress people who are women, both in the state legislature and in Washington. I think that's a good thing.

I think that, of course we were taught....I was brought up in Scarsdale but I had my last two years in Quaker boarding school in PA and they were interested in government too. I was always interested in government. As a matter of fact I majored in government at Barnard and I?m still concerned with it. #

EDUCATION UPDATE

■

FOR PARENTS, EDUCATORS & STUDENTS

R ATED BEST VALUE FOR STUDENTS

WHO LE ARN DIFFERENTLY.

■

NOV/DEC 2018

“

When it comes to the best colleges for students with learning disabilities, none holds a candle to Beacon College.

”

– BestValueSchools.com

WHY BE ACON? For more than a quarter century, Beacon College has been the recognized leader in offering affordable, career-focused baccalaureate degree programs for students with learning disabilities, ADHD and other learning differences. Our impressive results speak for themselves:

70%

BEACON COLLEGE

4-YEAR GRADUATION RATE Beacon’s 10-year average for students completing their bachelor degree in 4 years

37.8% NATIONAL AVERAGE

VS.

4-YEAR GRADUATION RATE

National 10-year average for ALL students, with and without an LD (Source: NECS)

THE BE ACON DIFFERENCE The College is committed to student success, offering academic and personal support services that help each student achieve his/her goals. Just a few of our impactful programs include: • The Summer for Success, our 3-week summer immersion for rising high school juniors and seniors focused on preparing them for the transition to college • Our Breakthrough Semester for visiting college students, a program uniquely structured to help current college students “get back on track” and secure or regain solid academic footing • Our NEW Bachelor of Science in Anthrozoology, exploring the extraordinary relationships and interactions that people have with animals, for students interested in careers in animal welfare, animal behavior and/or conservation

105 EAST MAIN STREET LEESBURG, FL 34748

PHONE: 855-220-5376 EMAIL: ADMISSIONS@BEACONCOLLEGE.EDU

BeaconCollege.edu